Aptos Vineyard

About the winery

Aptos Vineyard began as the Marlo family's vineyard in Aptos, and the winery dates the label to 1974². John Marlo had been a policeman in San Jose and moved to Aptos in 1961 to practice law; when he was elected a Superior Court judge in 1973 he planted vines on his property, its 1998 page on Web Winery said⁶. That page described 1,000 Pinot Noir vines on a ridge a mile from the ocean, which the judge pruned and tended himself. The Marlos, their five children and their grandchildren picked the grapes each fall, and Chuck Devlin of Devlin Wine Cellars made the wine. The vineyard was not open for tasting⁶.

By the winery's account today, Judge Marlo fell ill in the mid-2000s and the label lay dormant for many years²; he died in 2015⁵. James Baker, a friend of the judge, bought the label in 2018, with John Benedetti of Sante Arcangeli Family Wines making the wine; online sales began in 2020 and the first wine club in 2021².

The winery now works with four winemakers, among them Tony Craig of Silver Mountain Vineyards³, and its wines carry courtroom names, such as Opening Remarks Pinot Noir and Exhibit 3B Merlot⁴. Its tasting room in Aptos Village opened in July 2023⁵. It has since closed, after two and a half years by the winery's account, and the wine is sold online and at pop-up events¹.

Nearby in Santa Cruz Mountains

• Salamandre Wine Cellars AptosNo longer trading
• TGTrout Gulch Vineyards AptosNo longer trading
• Bargetto Winery SoquelOpen
• Burrell School Vineyards & Winery Los GatosOpen