Capo Isetta

A fifth-generation member of the Kunde winegrowing family, Ryan Kunde was born in the town of Sonoma, where a connection to the land runs deep. He earned a first degree at Arizona State, selling wine for Gallo along the way, before returning for a B.S. in Viticulture and Enology at UC Davis in 2011, then founding his own label, DRNK Wines, with his wife Katie in 2012. He brings that same precision to Capo Isetta, where he works with fruit from partner growers such as the Sangiacomo, Cuneo, and Kunde families. His philosophy pairs an inherited feel for the vineyard with modern data and small-lot fermentation, aiming for wines that are fruit-forward, layered, and ready to enjoy on release.

Capo, Italian for “chief”, is the name Bill and Marilyn Isetta chose to honor a family woven into California wine for nearly a century. Bill’s grandfather, Giacomo “Giac” Isetta, shaped wine barrels as a cooper in the 1920s; his father, Andy, worked at Christian Brothers before launching the Old Pioneer Wine Company. Marilyn’s father, Ray Hulmer, spent 35 years at Christian Brothers, where the two families first met. Today Bill, Marilyn, and their son Dominic, proprietors together, pour their handcrafted, small-lot wines from a warm, open-late tasting room on the Sonoma Plaza, a gathering place built, as Bill puts it, for friends old and new.