Gary and Ellen Luchtel met in college, where Gary courted her by bringing bottles wrapped in brown paper bags for blind tastings. They spent their twenties driving European back roads working out what they actually liked, then made wine at home for years while living in a San Francisco high-rise. A vineyard-manager friend tipped them off to a ten-acre parcel of brush in the southern valley, and they bought it in 2003, before Oak Knoll District existed as an appellation. The name puns on the Italian for "fortunate" and their surname — Gary's nickname is Lucky. They cleared the land and planted Syrah, Viognier, Cabernet Franc and Malbec, releasing their first wines in 2009. Everything is farmed without herbicides or pesticides and fermented on native yeasts, and a small solar-powered winery and hospitality space went up beside the vines in 2019.