Rajat Parr has cultivated a varied and distinguished career in wine. His first chapter was as a sommelier and wine director, beginning with his tutelage at San Francisco’s wine mecca Rubicon under the great sommelier Larry Stone and culminating years later as wine director for the Michael Mina group, where he was in charge of the wine programs in over 20 restaurants across the United States. During this time, he began to sow the seeds for his second chapter, as winemaker. Already a celebrated wine taster and explorer, Parr began to collaborate with other winemakers, notably the late Jim Clendenen of Au Bon Climat, to create his own small brand of wines. This experience led him to deepen his engagement with wine production through his ongoing collaboration in the vineyard and winery with winemaker Sashi Moorman and their successful brands Domaine de la Côte, Sandhi and Evening Land.

In recent years, Parr has continued to trace this trajectory to its natural terminus, becoming a winegrower himself. In recent years, he founded Phelan Farms of Cambria, California to farm and make the wine from their vineyards, focusing on regenerative agriculture and natural winemaking.