Regenerative Ecological Viticulture, taking maximum care of the environment and the soil, spontaneous plant covers.
Vinification: Manual harvest with selection of the fruit, maceration with whole grapes at 7º for 72-100 hours, indigenous yeasts, pressing and beating the lees for 4-5 months while fermenting.
Vineyard: Las Cuerdas and El Juncal, calcareous soils of medium depth, 100% espalier pruning, average age, 15 years. Location: In the municipality of Lanciego between 410m. and 560m. above sea level.
Azpillaga Urarte
Regenerative Viticulture
THE ORIGIN:
We are a family with a long winemaking tradition, Emilio Pérez de Azpillaga and M. Carmen Urarte cultivated vineyards and produced grapes for others until the 1960s, and from the 1970s they began to make their own wines. Twenty years later, in the 1980s, they built the new winery and began bottling the first brand: Viña El Pago.
AGROECOLOGY:
In 1993, after finishing his studies in Viticulture and Enology, Eduardo Pérez de Azpillaga Urarte, one of the sons, joins the family winery… on the condition that he can change the way of farming to one that is more respectful of the environment. environment. Once their proposal was accepted, they began to study, investigate and experiment with their own vineyards, gradually eliminating all chemical synthesis treatments, until in 2001 their vineyards received only natural and certified organic treatments.
RESULTS:
Throughout this time, as chemicals are removed from the vineyards, more and more quality is obtained in the grapes and a second wine, Señorío de Aztule, and a third, Fincas de Aztule, are produced. Between 2004 and 2006 we tested spontaneous plant covers in our vineyards, the result being so satisfactory that we implanted them in all our plots. At the same time, they begin to work with decoctions and plant extracts as treatments for our vineyards, fully immersing themselves in agroecology. As of 2010, after a great apprenticeship in "agrarian unlearning", they are the ones who produce almost 100% of the products with which they protect their vineyards (plant slurries, seawater extracts, hydroalcoholic plant extracts, microbiology , etc…). In 2011, Ignacio Pérez de Azpillaga Urarte, Eduardo's brother, joined the project.
CURRENT SITUATION:
Currently we are the two brothers who, together, cultivate our 12 hectares of vineyard and manage the winery. In addition to the objective of obtaining new wines with unique qualities, there is that of becoming 100% self-sufficient in the production of our grapes and, of course, our long-distance race, whose objective is marked by the commitment we have with Nature, to which We owe the happiness of living from what we like to do the most: exquisite wines that are respectful of the Earth that saw us born.
PLOTS
We have about 12 ha. spread over 30 different plots, located in Lanciego, Kripan and Elvillar. The altitude of our vineyards ranges from 390 meters above sea level (with a drier and warmer climate) to 625 meters (more Cantabrian climate, colder and more humid). Our smallest plot is 1,000 m2 (0.1 ha) and the largest is 13,000 m2 (1.3 ha). As our vineyards are so spread out, our vines grow on very different soils: calcareous (or limestone), which produce excellent quality grapes, clay-calcareous soils that also offer high quality grapes, and lastly, alluvial soils, which are not the best, but in which we have achieved, based on effort and research in the field of ecology, a quality in the grape that has surprised us.
