Portugal · Alentejo

ADEGA MAYOR

Campo Maior estate with 65 hectares of Alentejo vine and Portugal's first adega de autor, designed by Álvaro Siza Vieira.

The producer

Adega Mayor sits in Campo Maior in the Alto Alentejo, where Manuel Rui Azinhais Nabeiro planted the first vines in 1997 and opened a cellar designed by Álvaro Siza Vieira in June 2007. The estate covers 350 hectares of cork oak and farmland, with 65 hectares under vine across two properties, the larger being Herdade das Argamassas. Paulo Laureano leads winemaking. The range moves from the generous, dark-fruited Caiado tier through Altitude Tinto, aged in 500-litre barrels and balseiros, which shows finer tannins and better-integrated oak than the entry wines.

Known for

Alentejo reds from Campo Maior's first adega de autor

Notable facts

The story

A decade to open

In 1997, Manuel Rui Azinhais Nabeiro planted the first vines at Campo Maior with no winery yet built. The plan was deliberate: let the vineyard take shape, then commission a building equal to the project. He chose Álvaro Siza Vieira. The brief carried a practical requirement: the Alentejo's summer heat, if let into the cellar, makes stable ageing impossible. Siza Vieira's answer was the white exterior, which reflects rather than absorbs the sun, holding the interior temperature steady. The winery opened in June 2007, ten years after the first plantings, and acquired a designation Portugal had not previously used: adega de autor.

From the atlas

Adega Mayor

A Campo Maior estate where 65 hectares of Alentejo vineyard meet a building by Álvaro Siza Vieira, Portugal's first winery conceived as a unified architectural project.

At A Glance

RegionAlentejo, Portugal
VillageCampo Maior
Main grapesAragonez, Trincadeira, Alicante Bouschet
Signature wineAltitude Tinto
Defining featurePortugal's first adega de autor, designed by Álvaro Siza Vieira

The Producer

The first vines at Adega Mayor went into the ground in 1997, in the Alentejo municipality of Campo Maior. The project was the idea of Manuel Rui Azinhais Nabeiro, head of the Nabeiro Group, a family-owned Portuguese conglomerate. Ten years after those first plantings, in June 2007, a building by the architect Álvaro Siza Vieira opened on the estate, its white walls, clean geometry, and low horizontal form making it a distinct presence in the flat Alentejo landscape. The winery was designated Portugal's first adega de autor, a term coined for a winery conceived as a unified architectural and winemaking project. Paulo Laureano leads the winemaking team; Carlos Rodrigues is also named among the estate's winemakers.

Place

Campo Maior sits in the Alto Alentejo, the broad inland plain that pushes east toward the Spanish border. The Alentejo is Portugal's largest wine region and its warmest, with long dry summers, intense sun, and an absence of the Atlantic cooling that moderates temperatures further west. For the vine, the consequence is full, rapid ripening and a natural generosity of fruit. The estate spreads across 350 hectares of cork oak, holm oak, riverside terraces, and farmland, of which 65 hectares across two estates are planted to vine.

Soil And Site

The primary vineyard holding is Herdade das Argamassas, where 55 of the estate's 65 planted hectares are concentrated. The Alentejo plateau provides the sun exposure and heat accumulation that ripen Aragonez, Trincadeira, and Alicante Bouschet through the long growing season. The Altitude bottling, drawn from higher ground within the estate, shows how elevation within this flat region changes the result: the wine carries fine tannins and fruit that integrates cleanly with oak rather than reading as soft or overripe.

Story

Manuel Rui Azinhais Nabeiro planted the first vines at Campo Maior in 1997, when the Nabeiro Group was already established around coffee and other goods. The wine project was built from the ground up rather than acquired, with 55 hectares developed at Herdade das Argamassas before the winery facility existed. When the time came to build the cellar, Nabeiro commissioned Álvaro Siza Vieira, the Pritzker Prize-winning Porto architect. The brief called for a building whose white exterior would reflect the intense Alentejo light and, in doing so, help maintain a stable internal temperature for wine conservation and ageing. The result opened in June 2007. Manuel Rui Azinhais Nabeiro died in March 2023, aged 91, having seen the estate through its first quarter-century.

Vineyards And Cellar

The 65 vineyard hectares are split across two estates, with Herdade das Argamassas accounting for 55 of them. The Caiado range uses Aragonez, Trincadeira, and Alicante Bouschet for the red and draws on cool-temperature fermentation for the rosé, with the must clarified and fermented between 14 and 16 degrees Celsius after manual harvest, gentle destemming, and pressing. The Altitude Tinto is aged in 500-litre barrels and wooden vats called balseiros, a vessel size and material that allows slower oxygen exchange than smaller new barrique and preserves the site's fine-tannin character.

Wines

The range moves from the Caiado tier through the Altitude and Reserva do Comendador bottlings, with a sparkling wine completing the portfolio. Caiado Tinto, from Aragonez, Trincadeira, and Alicante Bouschet, is the entry red: dark fruit, plum, blackberry, chocolate, and a spiced, oak-touched bouquet. Caiado Rosé, in salmon pink, opens with strawberry, raspberry, and pomegranate on the nose, and finishes dry and persistent on the palate. Altitude Tinto is the cellar's more deliberate work: ripe fruit held in check by fine tannins, with the balseiro and 500-litre barrel ageing filling the palate without adding weight. The Reserva do Comendador and the sparkling wine extend the range without departing from the Alentejo red-fruit and warmth character that the estate is built around.

In The Glass

Caiado Tinto opens with plum, blackberry, dark cherry, chocolate, and lavender, with oak and spice woven through the bouquet. The palate has the ripe, generous fruit that the Alentejo growing season delivers, with enough grip from the Alicante Bouschet and Trincadeira to keep the wine from feeling flat. Caiado Rosé is fresh and clean: strawberry, raspberry, pomegranate, a light floral note, then a dry, fruit-forward finish with good persistence. Altitude Tinto is quieter in its approach: the aroma is fine and fresh rather than loud, the fruit matures fully but integrates with the oak rather than sitting on top of it, and the tannins are fine-grained, with a palate that favours texture over immediate weight.

A Bottle To Understand It

Altitude Tinto is the bottle to open first. It is an Alentejo red aged in 500-litre barrels and balseiros, made from estate fruit at Campo Maior and vinified to show fine tannins and ripe fruit absorbed into the oak rather than coating it. Where Caiado Tinto reads as an open, generous red, Altitude Tinto is more composed: the fruit is present but quieter, the tannin grain is finer, and the finish carries more length and definition. It shows what the estate does when the cellar team has more time and more deliberate vessel choices working in its favour.

Anecdote

In 1997, Manuel Rui Azinhais Nabeiro planted the first vines at Campo Maior with no existing winery on the estate. The plan was to build the cellar after the vineyard had taken shape, and the choice of architect was Álvaro Siza Vieira. Siza Vieira's brief included a practical constraint the Alentejo imposes on any serious cellar: the summer heat, if admitted through walls and rooflines, makes stable wine ageing impossible. The solution was the building's white exterior, which reflects rather than absorbs the Alentejo sun and holds the interior temperature steady through the long, hot season. The winery opened in June 2007, a decade after the first plantings, and immediately acquired the designation adega de autor, a term Portugal had not previously applied to any winery.

Final Word

Adega Mayor is a Campo Maior estate with 65 hectares of Alentejo vine, a winemaking team led by Paulo Laureano, and a building by Álvaro Siza Vieira that was the first of its kind in Portugal. The wines run from the generous, dark-fruited Caiado tier to the finer-grained Altitude, with the Alentejo sun doing the ripening and the cellar choices determining the grain.

Sources

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