Andrew was a good man. I have some old photos of visiting him when he was doing wine in San Francisco a decade ago. He was part of the crew that was part of my early ascent in CA wines, along with Loring, Dain, Siduri and Copain. He made wines in screw cap, ala Loring, and made pinot from some of the cool places in the early days. I stopped buying the wines maybe 8 or so years ago. I wish him the best, as he always treated me well.
It looks like the last ones I bought were from the 2012 vintage. Not sure why I stopped. I always enjoyed his Pinot. I wish him good luck in his next venture as well.
I bought some 10 years ago or more. It was very nice wine. He should be proud of his accomplishments. Business is hard. We should all be poets! Poets of the vine…
I wonder what happened? WS has consistently scored his wines well I believe.
Was he the first person to make the leap from board member to winemaker? Seems like that was very early from WS or Parker. I can’t remember the story because he stopped communicating via boards after he got going. Even if his label failed I’d think with his experience he’ll find gigs at this point.
Sad to see this. A.P. Vin was one of those wines that I started buying when I transitioned over from “buying wine” to “buying people”. Alas, many of those people have dropped out of the business. (Dain, Match, Bressler, and now A.P. Vin to name a few.) I stopped buying direct from the winery because I could source it retail without the added shipping cost. Maybe I’ll have to make one last order for old times sake. (Unless Bud grabbed it all.) Thanks goodness Ed K., Brian L. and Jim MacPhail still make wine or my cellar would be in trouble!
I recently opened a 2016 AP Vin Clos Pepe that was delicious - so as a consumer, I agree he did a great job with your fruit.
I very much enjoyed all of Andrew’s wines and sad to hear of this news.
Was he the first to go from board member to winemaker? Don’t know for sure but recall meeting Russell Bevan in the late 1990’s when WS had an active board and from what I can recall (that was many many bottles ago so the memory might be fuzzy) he was in the wine industry soon thereafter. Interesting question though…