ROB DAFOE

Winemaker | Owner

A Santa Barbara native, Rob is a winemaker who loves the human process of wine. The art and the beautiful disaster that culminates in bottled history. Paramount to this is the evolution and unfolding significance of this beautiful area.

Rob’s path to wine making was not typical. During a winter break from High School 1988, he boarded a Greyhound bus headed for Truckee, California to visit friends. After 2 weeks in the snow he came home with Chicken Pox, wild stories and most importantly, addicted to the young sport of snowboarding. That next winter, he left college to take a skate/snow boarding trip to Canada. The road home brought him back to Lake Tahoe where the pull of the mountains took hold. At the time, Lake Tahoe was a proving ground for the quickly evolving sport and after gaining sponsorships, he was able to travel to Europe for contests and photography trips, all along the way making friends and drinking wine.  The connection with France and its culture was immediate. The historical, artistic and elevated yet humble nature of wine had a profound effect. All in for the liquid, the land, and the culture of the people who created it, he felt an intuitive connection that he knew would figure prominently for him later in life. In 2000 he made the move back to Santa Barbara County and the Santa Ynez Valley to pursue the craft. Twenty plus years since and 20 vintages of wine making, DAFOE WINES is the culmination of the passion for wine he found so many years ago.