During the 1790s, Spanish missionaries recognized the rare soils and favorable climate of the Santa Lucia Highlands of Monterey and planted grapevines there. Yet nearly two hundred years later when our founder Nicolaus (Nicky) Hahn and his wife Gaby first purchased land in the Highlands, cattle, sheep and horses ranged over the hills. Vineyards were a secondary concern. Nicky immediately saw that the land he’d purchased was destined for greater things than grazing stock. He wasted no time. In 1980, the Hahns released their first wine from SLH. A mere eight years later, Nicky led the charge to establish SLH as an American Viticultural Area, a dream he saw realized in 1991. Today, Hahn Family Wines, now run by Nicky and Gaby’s son Philip, owns and sustainably farms 650 acres of estate vineyards in the Santa Lucia Highlands. SLH enjoys worldwide acclaim for the Pinot Noir and Chardonnay made there.