From Napa with Love

W. Clarke Swanson wants a photo of himself with two of his daughters. But eldest daughter Alexis is more interested in getting down to business. "Dad, we can shoot a photo of us, but first we need one of you by yourself," she says, feigning exasperation but clearly tickled by his eagerness.

In the beautiful new salon (it was recently featured in The New York Times) of Swanson Vineyards, the family's Napa Valley winery, the Swanson patriarch has gathered with Alexis; his youngest daughter, Claiborne; salon manager Shawn Q. Larue and artist Ira Yeager, whose series of Italian peasant paintings, dated 1799 to give a turn-of-the-19th-century impression, covers the walls of the intimate tasting room. There's an easy camaraderie between the five. Seated at the salon's octagonal wood table, Claiborne leans over as Alexis spoons thimblefuls of caviar onto potato chips, whispering as if the two were conspiratorial teenagers. Max ("a mutt," she says) and Jean-Lafitte, a wirehaired dachshund, rest under the table. Ira and Clarke discuss Yeager's studio showing in San Francisco, which will take place the next day, with Shawn listening in, as they sip glasses of the winery's 2002 cabernet sauvignon blend Alexis, named for Ms. Swanson herself.

It's shortly before noon in the Napa Valley. The harvest has come and gone, and the vines have begun to wither and yellow. The delicate autumnal light is breathtaking. Alexis, as director of marketing for Swanson Vineyards, is in the middle of overhauling the winery's Web site. For her, this mini family reunion is the beginning of a long day of work. But being with members of her family (middle sister Veronica and mother Elizabeth were not able to attend) sends her into a reverie about her childhood in Naples. "It was a marvelous existence," she recalls. "Growing up, there was so much untouched natural beauty. It was like being in a state of grace to experience that on a daily basis."

The Swanson family moved to Naples in 1971. They left their full-time residence in Southwest Florida for the Napa Valley in 1985, but they return often. When they do, they repeat the same daily rituals they once did. "Our day starts in Naples with all of us piling into a canary-yellow 1974 Pinto with leopard-print seat covers-the same one we rode in when I was a kid," says Alexis. "We drive to our favorite Cuban coffee shop in east Naples, La Sorpresa, for Cuban coffee and ham croquetas. We bike; we roller skate. We eat stone crabs and Key lime pie. We host dinner parties on the beach, and, many nights at dusk we wander the back alleys of Old Naples. Naples is engrained in my DNA; it's about nostalgic comfort and a celebration of the mundane."

The salon at the family's winery is an extension of that idea. Located in the small town of Rutherford between tiny-but-tony Yountville and retail-shop-heavy St. Helena, the winery's tasting room is like an oasis in the Napa Valley's desert of pack-'em-in and slug-'em-back tasting bars. Tastings at the salon are by appointment only, but there's nothing exclusive or alienating about the proprietors' approach to wine. Alexis, Shawn and the staff foster an environment where wine serves more as a social lubricant than as a vehicle for wine descriptor one-upmanship. With a maximum of eight guests per seating, the Swansons' merlot and pinot grigio are sipped from Riedel glassware in a room with coral-colored walls, a roaring fireplace and whimsical touches like leopard-print napkins, which could be a subconscious echo of those Pinto seat covers. Throw in samples of Alexis' American farm-raised osetra caviar, potato chips and curry-powder-dusted chocolates set on a scallop shell, and guests are bound to get familiar.

As Alexis joins Claiborne for Dad's requested family photo in the salon's doorway, it's easy to see that, in their warm way with each other and their celebration of life's little pleasures, they've brought a bit of Naples to northern California.