Wine experts, journalists, gurus and buffs identify him with his capacity to be one step ahead of events; they highlight his audacity, his insight, his charm and his encyclopaedic-like knowledge of viticulture. We are referring to none other than Álvaro Palacios, who on hearing these compliments, smiles, closes his eyes and searches his heart to find the philosophy which is behind every wine he makes at the family bodega in Rioja, as well as in Priorato and Bierzo.

Where others see yields and polyphenols, anthocyanins, yeasts, and a world which is becoming increasingly technically-orientated and logical, Álvaro Palacios is capable of finding a previously unsuspected nuance in every terroir. He looks at the land, he studies it, he walks its length and breadth, and that is when the oenologist and viticulturist is at his very best; a professional who is capable of understanding the murmurs, demands and pleasures of the land.

Álvaro Palacios believes that wine is the land, that wine is born of the land and that the land also seems to have found its perfect ally in wine, because he is able to understand and interpret it to perfection, both through the wines he makes at the family bodega in Alfaro, under QDO Rioja and DO Bierzo, and in Gratallops, under DO Priorato, the three apex of his ‘vital triangle’. “If they asked me to describe myself in just one image it would have to be on my knees, with one ear to the ground, and a little notebook in my hand to write down the mineral murmur which comes from the land”, he stated.