Markham Vineyards: The Cabernet Connoisseur’s Tasting Experience


A photography & videography concept shot inside Markham Vineyards’ historic St. Helena tasting room and 1879 stone cellar — the craft, the pour, and the people who share it.



Location

Markham Vineyards, St. Helena, Napa Valley, CA


Concept & Direction

Verena Dohmen, Daniel Dohmen


Photographer & Videographer

Verena Dohmen, Daniel Dohmen (Video Assistance)


Post-Production & Photo Editing

Verena Dohmen

Markham Vineyards has stood on the same stretch of St. Helena soil since 1874, when Bordeaux-born vintner Jean Laurent raised the valley’s fourth-oldest continuously operating winery from a stone cellar built with rock quarried at nearby Glass Mountain. More than a century of vintages later, that same cellar still holds the barrels — and still frames the ritual of the pour.


For The Cabernet Connoisseur’s Tasting Experience, I was engaged to capture that lineage in photo and video: an afternoon built around the estate’s vast tasting room, the adjacent barrel room, and the Wine Ambassadors who carry Markham’s story from bottle to guest.


The story moves the way the afternoon does — through the door and into warm light, a wine thief pulled from the barrel, glasses swirled and raised, cheese and figs set beside candlelight, two hero wines held up to a farm window. Nothing staged harder than it needs to be — just the craft, caught as it happens, built to give someone who has never set foot in St. Helena the feeling of sitting at that table.

Group of people tasting wine in a rustic barrel cellar with stone walls and oak barrels.

 

DELIVERABLES

 

PHOTOGRAPHY


Focus — Tasting room, barrel room, guests

Hero shots — The two featured wines



Stills built for marketing, social, and digital campaigns — usable independently or alongside the video content.

A woman gestures toward oak wine barrels in a dimly lit winery cellar during a barrel tasting tour.
A tattooed winemaker pours red wine from a barrel into a glass at Markham Napa Valley Vineyards.
Woman tasting red wine from a glass in front of oak barrels at Markham Napa Valley winery.
Woman smiling receiving a glass of red wine in Markham Napa Valley Vineyards barrel room.
Multiple glasses of red wine on a tasting table at Markham Napa Valley winery.
Hands using a corkscrew to open a dark wine bottle with a black label in a warm cellar setting.
Three women smiling and toasting with red wine glasses in a rustic winery barrel room.
Person holding a bottle of red wine and a glass of red wine at a table.
A woman in a hat enjoys a wine tasting with red wines and charcuterie board at Markham Napa Valley.
Elegant red wine tasting setup with multiple glasses, charcuterie board, and wine bottle.
Three people enjoying a wine tasting tour inside a rustic winery barrel cellar.
Tattooed hands using a corkscrew to open a bottle of red wine in a winery.
Guests enjoy wine tasting in a rustic stone barrel cellar at a winery.
Four guests enjoy a wine tasting in a rustic stone-walled winery, chatting and holding red wine glasses.
Four adults socializing at a rustic winery, holding red wine glasses amid stone walls and oak barrels.
Guests smile and taste red wine at an elegant winery table set with multiple wine glasses and food pairings.
People socializing at a rustic winery tasting room with oak barrels and stone walls in the background.
Two men enjoying wine tasting at a rustic stone winery, engaged in conversation while holding glasses of red and white wine.
A tattooed man holds a wine glass while another person pours red wine using a wine thief in a barrel cellar.
A red wine bottle nestled between oak aging barrels in a dimly lit winery cellar.
Hands filling a dark wine bottle from an oak barrel using a wine thief tool.
Smiling woman holding a glass of red wine at a wine tasting event in a restaurant.
Aged oak wine barrels stacked in a dimly lit cellar at Markham Napa Valley Vineyards.
Two women enjoying red wine beside Markham Napa Valley Vineyards oak barrels.
A smiling woman relaxes among wine barrels in a cellar, holding a glass of red wine, wearing a denim dress and gold bracelet.
Young Black woman with curly hair examines a glass of red wine in warm, dimly lit setting.
Two women sipping red wine from glasses while seated together in a dimly lit barrel room winery.
Elegant wine tasting with red wines and gourmet charcuterie cheese board on a slate platter.
Cheerful woman in glasses presenting a bottle of wine at a rustic stone cellar wine tasting event.
Red wine being poured into glasses during an elegant wine tasting event with guests seated at a rustic table.

HERO VIDEO


Format — Horizontal, 4K, 20–30 sec

Channels — YouTube, Google Ads, IG 9:16 crop



The full tasting experience in one continuous story — the “one-in-all” master edit that anchors every campaign built from this shoot.

B-ROLL


Format — 2–5 sec, horizontal & vertical, loopable

Channels — Stories, Reels, ad backgrounds


Close-ups of the pour, tasting gestures, and ambient light — modular content that keeps campaigns moving long after the shoot.