Californian wine with a French accent

Wines come in many styles; some are bold and brash whilst others are discreet and elegant. Californian wines tend to be somewhat extrovert and for a long time neither my wife nor I warm to its charms.
This was one of the first Californian wines to win us over. It was not as loud as some examples and definitely not of the "I'm oakier than you" school. It is said that some of the earlier Dominus vintages need a lot of time to open up; well I got to know Californian wines late and this had over 15 years of bottle age before I got to sample it. I suppose the fact that it is owned by Christian Moueix of Pomerol might explain the tendency of this Californian version of red Bordeaux towards elegance rather than naked power. Christian runs the famous Bordeaux estates such as Chateaux Petrus, Magdelaine and La Fleur Petrus.
In the first 8 vintages (1983-1990) of Dominus Napa, as the wine was establishing its identity, the winery commissioned a number of artist to make portraits of Christian Moueix for the labels. This 1986 label was produced by Jim Dine. Since 1991, a classic Bordeaux style label is used.