Joe Shirley
Director of Winemaking

Joe Shirley was born in Long Beach and raised in Napa Valley. He's that rare bird known as a California native. After high school, Joe headed back down south to earn his Bachelor of Arts degree in Exercise Physiology from Occidental College in Los Angeles.

"I was premed and interested in sports medicine. Fortunately, I was talked out it. I then looked for some other applied science to pursue and decided on either forensics or winemaking. While attending a barbecue at Maynard Amerine's house, I met a few people from the department, drank some wine and thought, 'Hmmm, this is fun.' Shortly thereafter, I enrolled at the University of California, Davis where I eventually received my Master of Science in Enology."

After college, Joe launched his winemaking career at Sonoma Cutrer in 1997. He joined Trinchero Winery in 1999 as Enologist and worked his way up the ladder to become winemaker in February of 2002 for Trinchero Family Selection and the Trinchero Napa wines.

In 2007, Joe accepted the position as head winemaker for Napa Cellars. His extensive experience in crafting Napa Valley wines now lends to his winemaking efforts on pure varietal expression for the Napa Cellars wines.

Beyond the sensory-driven, artistic side of winemaking, Joe is also a leader in the technical aspects of his craft. His work on grape seed tannins was published in the American Journal of Enology and Viticulture. Joe also did the research and was a co-author of a letter published in the Lancet (the British equivalent of the Journal of the American Medical Association) on the phenolic content of chocolate.

Joe makes his home in Napa with wife Monette and two children. In his spare time he plays with his daughter Savannah, drives an old Datsun Roadster 1600 and does the NY Times Sunday crossword in pen. Joe once bowled a 252.