Beyond Category: Twelve Vintages of Hors Catégorie

BY ERIC GUIDO | JUNE 30, 2026

There are very few wines that flirt with perfection, but vintage after vintage, Hors Catégorie consistently stands among them. In his 2017 article, Washington: Various Shades of Hot, Stephen Tanzer predicted that the Hors Catégorie Syrah would become one of the New World's greatest and longest-lived wines. Having now revisited each vintage, from the previously unreleased 2013 to the 2024 from barrel, the accuracy of his prediction is undeniable. Hors Catégorie is one of the most singular wines in the world, from one of the most difficult places to farm. It’s a wine that only Christophe Baron could conceptualize and create.

Back to the Beginning

Long before Hors Catégorie, Christophe Baron had an uncanny ability to realize a site's potential and a long track record of successes. Baron first came to the Walla Walla Valley in 1993, working as an intern at Waterbrook Winery then at Adelsheim Vineyard in Willamette Valley. In 1995, his travels brought him to Australia’s Barossa Valley to work the harvest. After a stint in Romania, Baron returned to the United States, seeking to plant Pinot Noir in the Willamette Valley. As luck would have it, he came across a site that inspired him on a trip to Walla Walla. This would become the Cailloux vineyard, where Baron planted his first vines on the Oregon side of the Walla Walla Valley. Baron refers to this area as “The Stones,” named for the basalt cobblestones that litter the soils. Since the terroir reminded him of Châteauneuf-du-Pape, he planted the vineyards with Rhône varieties, bottling them under the Cayuse Vineyards label. 

Cailloux, planted in 1997 in The Rocks District of Milton-Freewater, was Christophe Baron’s first vineyard.

Success came relatively quickly. Baron opened a tasting room in downtown Walla Walla and moved his winemaking to “The Stones” in the early 2000s, adjacent to Cailloux vineyard. At the time, Baron began transitioning to biodynamic practices across all of his vineyards. He closed the tasting room and converted Cayuse Vineyards to a mailing list model, with only a small percentage reserved for distribution. Over the following years, Baron introduced the No Girls brand from his La Paciencia vineyard. Under the full control of vigneronne Elizabeth Bourcier, No Girls captures elegance and grace from La Paciencia’s silty cobblestone soils and tightly spaced vines. Next came Horsepower in 2009, inspired by Baron’s desire to reintroduce nineteenth-century French farming techniques in his vineyards. He planted the three Horsepower vineyards with extremely tight, meter-by-meter spacing. To this day, the rows are tilled by a team of Belgian and Percheron draft horses, preventing the soil compaction that mechanical tillers cause. The wines are the most rugged and intense of Baron’s broad portfolio.

Draft horses till the rows in the aptly named Horsepower vineyards.

But even after all that, Baron felt something was missing. He wanted to craft his own interpretation of the Northern Rhône through the lens of Walla Walla Valley, but he couldn’t find the right location in “The Stones.” Baron spent years looking, with an eye toward the foothills of the Blue Mountains. In 2011, he found it.

The Birth of Hors Catégorie

Baron encountered the site for his next project while cycling through the foothills of the Blue Mountains near the north fork of the Walla Walla River. Situated at 1,350 to 1,450 feet of elevation, this 33-acre site was a mix of pastures, forests and orchards. It also had water rights dating back to the 1880s, which is crucial for success in this desert-like environment. Baron purchased the property in 2011 and immediately set about planting the Hors Catégorie (French for “beyond category”) vineyard, using a massal selection of Syrah cuttings from the Northern Rhône. The vineyard is naturally divided by aspect. The south slope, which Baron refers to as his "Côte Brune," consists of darker, clay-heavy soil (approximately 35% clay), while the lighter east slope, what he calls his "Côte Blonde," contains about 8% clay. Asked whether he is ever tempted to bottle the slopes individually, Baron was resolute in his answer: “Nope. The best wine is always the blend. Always.” 

The vineyard’s severe incline, as much as 60% in places, requires not only 100% manual farming and harvesting, but also the assistance of a winch. Baron chose single-stake (Échalas) vine training with 3.5 by 3.5-foot spacing. The vines barely yield 1.5 tons of fruit per acre in a good year. As brutal as it is to farm – and climb, as I learned firsthand – the Hors Catégorie vineyard is inspiring to take in.

Christophe Baron presents 12 vintages of Hors Catégorie.

Baron vinifies the fruit from each slope separately, utilizing wild yeasts and cool fermentations that never exceed 85°F. He fermented the first three vintages (2013, 2014 and 2015) with 100% whole bunches but backed that down to 80-90% from 2016 on. The wines are aged in a combination of neutral and third-fill demi-muids for 18 months, with blending of the two parcels taking place in the spring following the harvest. The bottled wine aged for another two years prior to release.

The result is consistently one of the wildest and most complex Syrahs I’ve ever encountered. The Hors Catégorie Syrah is deceptively approachable in its youth, but it deserves patience. Though not as structured as many of its Northern Rhône cousins, the Hors Catégorie gains textural weight and fruit sweetness through cellaring.

In tasting the very first vintage, the unreleased 2013, the potential of this site was evident. Baron hinted at possibly releasing some magnums in the future but did not provide a date or estimated price. It’s amazing to think that a wine made from second-leaf fruit could show such potential. Then again, Baron’s first vintage of Cayuse Syrah Cailloux Vineyard, the 1999, also came from second-leaf fruit. When Stephen Tanzer wrote about the debut release of the 2014 Hors Catégorie and gave it 97 points, he clearly saw the potential here, even though the vineyard was only planted three years prior. The 2014 is just as good as Tanzer predicted, if not better, and it is still maturing.

Hors Catégorie in all its glory.

Vintage after vintage left me totally impressed. Interestingly, I found myself favoring the warmer seasons on many occasions, except for the 2015. The 2015 simply lacks the verve that typically pushes Hors Catégorie across the threshold from very good to excellent. My preference for warmer seasons could have to do with vine age, as the vines excelled in years like 2018 and 2021. Then again, the extended, cooler 2022 season produced one of the most complex wines in this vertical. The 2020 is also notable, despite the vintage's reputation for smoke taint. I can attest that there’s no hint of smoke in this beauty, other than Syrah’s typical varietal notes. The current-release 2023 shows the ripeness of the year, but with an acidic spine imparted by the cool conditions leading up to harvest. It is a truly exciting Hors Catégorie to enjoy over the coming decades. 

This vertical proved that Christophe Baron's instincts were correct: the Walla Walla Valley can and does produce transcendent wines with tremendous aging potential and the ability to impress New-World and Old-World palates alike.

I tasted the wines for this report in March 2026 with Christophe Baron in New York City.

© 2026, Vinous. No portion of this article may be copied, shared or redistributed without prior consent from Vinous. Doing so is not only a violation of our copyright but also threatens the survival of independent wine criticism.

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