History of a tradition
A family winery
Around 1860, our great-grandfathers Manuel Fernández and Ismael Ábalos were already growing their vines in San Asensio. With the grapes from these vines, they made wine for the family and for sale in wineskins in the village and the area round about.
Our maternal grandfather Pablo continued with this tradition and at the beginning of the 20th century became one of the first farmers in La Rioja to buy himself a tractor, an “Allgaier Porsche”. Meanwhile our paternal grandfather, Florentino, built a small winery, increased production and took an important step forward by replacing the wineskins with bottles, so enabling him to increase sales outside the area.
Following on in his father’s footsteps and with the addition of his father-in-law’s vineyards, our father, Florentino, built another larger winery. This meant he needed more workers for bottling the wine and for working the vineyards, while he himself concentrated on selling his wines all over Spain and even abroad. At that time the winery also began aging its wine, launching our first crianzas and reservas.
We are the next generation in the family saga, Florentino’s sons, Pablo, Rodolfo, Ismael and José Miguel. Although we still use our father’s winery in San Asensio for making our young wines, we have also set up a new winery in Hervías where our more special wines are made.
We have concentrated our efforts on producing wines made in selected barrels with grapes produced by traditional cultivation of the vines using the same methods as our ancestors.
First Tractor Grandfather Paul |