Wait Cellars

Wait Cellars was founded in 2005 by Bob Wait, a local to San Francisco’s Lower Haight neighborhood and owner of The Page on Divisadero Street in San Francisco. Dumbfounded by the physical beauty of California’s north coast upon arrival from Michigan in 1988, Wait Cellars in some ways represents a way to connect with and consummate an understanding of this unique and gorgeous land.

Wait Cellars’ goal is to produce limited amounts of balanced, serious wine from carefully chosen fruit. We seek cool, gently farmed, low-yield vineyards within a local radius. Much of our fruit currently comes from Devoto Gardens, in Sebastopol, and we are slowly developing our own vineyard in the Roblar Valley area of the Sebastopol Hills.

We follow a non-interventionist, old-world sensibility in the winery: a percentage of whole cluster fruit as the vintage allows, native fermentations, elevage sur lie, a modest oak program, no enzymes, fining or filtration. The result being a profound, transparent expression of the varietal and vineyard on our label: a genuineness and an elegance through simplicity.

Bob hails from Michigan and holds a BSE from the University of Michigan. He has taken wine and grape-growing courses over the years through UC Berkeley and Davis, and is in the winemakers program at UC Davis. Wait Cellars is a fully bonded California winery, currently leasing equipment and space at the Bluxome Street Winery in San Francisco’s SOMA district. It was conceived as a small, family-managed endeavor from the beginning, to channel a passion for wines made simply, on a human scale. David Wait, Bob’s brother, designs and carves the woodcuts featured on all Wait Cellars labels.

We hope you enjoy our wines.