Spain · Priorat

Bell Cros (Skoglund Wine Estate S.L.)

Organic estate in DO Montsant, Tarragona, founded in 2017 by Swedish entrepreneurs Ann and Peter Skoglund, who sold their Swedish business to farm a Catalan valley. The founding wine, El Tracte, is named after the traditional handshake that sealed the purchase of the first vineyard from its previous owners.

The producer

Bell Cros sits in DO Montsant, the Catalan appellation that wraps around Priorat in the hills of Tarragona province. Ann and Peter Skoglund, who had built and sold a business in Sweden, discovered Montsant wines on visits to Barcelona and moved quickly: on September 13, 2017, they bought a 6-hectare parcel of Carinyena vines from two local farmers, Joan and Maria, and sealed the purchase with a traditional Catalan handshake called a tracte. They named their first wine after it.

The estate has since grown to 25 hectares, all farmed under certified organic management, with a purpose-built winery completed in 2022. El Tracte, made from Carinyena on the founding parcel, is a deep-colored, age-worthy red with documented potential to 2045. La Figaflor, a Garnacha Blanca white, was named best Garnacha Blanca in La Guía de Vins de Catalunya 2024.

Known for

Organic Carinyena red and Garnacha Blanca white from DO Montsant, Tarragona, Catalonia.

Notable facts

The story

The Handshake That Named the Wine

On September 13, 2017, Ann and Peter Skoglund stood in a vineyard in the Montsant hills of Tarragona and shook hands with Joan and Maria, the farmers who had worked that land before them. The handshake was a tracte, the traditional Catalan form of agreement that predates written contracts and carries its own legal and cultural weight in the region. The Skoglunds were acquiring 6 hectares and 4,000 kilograms of Carinyena grapes still on the vine. When the first wine came from those grapes, they called it El Tracte: not after the vineyard, not after the valley, but after the handshake itself. That gesture between two pairs of hands in September 2017 now appears on every bottle of the estate's founding red.

From the atlas

Bell Cros (Skoglund Wine Estate S.L.)

At A Glance

The Producer

Bell Cros sits in DO Montsant, the Catalan appellation that wraps around Priorat in the hills of Tarragona province. The name translates from old Catalan as beautiful valley: bell for beautiful, cros an archaic local word for valley that no longer appears in everyday speech. Ann and Peter Skoglund, who had built and sold a business in Sweden, discovered Montsant wines on visits to Barcelona and decided, with unusual speed, to become the people who made them. On September 13, 2017, they bought a 6-hectare parcel of Carinyena vines from two local farmers, Joan and Maria, and sealed the transaction in the traditional Catalan way, with a handshake. They named their first wine after it.

The estate has grown from that original 6 hectares to 25, all farmed organically. The winery facility was completed in 2022. The two wines available in the verified source range are El Tracte, a Carinyena red made from the founding parcel, and La Figaflor, a Garnacha Blanca white that was named best Garnacha Blanca in La Guía de Vins de Catalunya 2024.

Place

Montsant is a DO carved out of the province of Tarragona in southern Catalonia. It forms a rough ring around Priorat, sharing similar granite and slate subsoils, including the dark fragmented llicorella slate that characterises the wider zone, but producing wines at a different price level. The appellation covers a varied landscape of hills and valleys in the Serra de Montsant mountains, with vineyards planted at altitude on poor, mineral-rich soils that force vines to work for water and produce concentrated rather than generous fruit.

The name Bell Cros, beautiful valley, is a description of where the estate stands, and the physical address matters to the wine. Low-yielding organic vines on thin Montsant soils give Carinyena its deep pigment, its dense black-fruit aromatics, and the structural grip that allows long ageing. Garnacha Blanca from the same terroir produces whites with the weight and aromatic complexity that earned La Figaflor its 2024 guide recognition.

Soil And Site

DO Montsant soils are dominated by granite and slate, with significant deposits of llicorella, the dark fractured slate found across both Montsant and neighbouring Priorat. These soils drain fast, retain heat into cool nights, and provide poor nutrition, which keeps vine vigour low and concentrates flavour in small, thick-skinned grapes. Specific parcel-level soil mapping for Bell Cros is not confirmed in available sources. What the estate's wines demonstrate is that the appellation's soils are doing the expected work: El Tracte carries the deep pigment, mineral-edged aromatics, and ageing architecture typical of Carinyena grown under these conditions.

Story

Ann and Peter Skoglund did not arrive in Montsant through a family connection or professional apprenticeship. They arrived as wine drinkers who had decided, after encounters with the appellation's bottles around Barcelona, that the valley they kept reading about was worth more than a visit. When they sold their Swedish business, Montsant was where the proceeds went.

The September 2017 purchase was a 6-hectare beginning, not a finished plan. The name they chose for the estate, Bell Cros, was already there in the landscape. The name they chose for the first wine, El Tracte, came from the handshake that closed the deal, a Catalan word for the traditional verbal and physical agreement that once governed land transfers in the region.

Over the following years the Skoglunds expanded the estate to 25 hectares, maintained organic certification across all vineyards, and built a purpose-designed winery in 2022 to replace earlier production arrangements. La Figaflor, the estate's Garnacha Blanca, emerged from that new facility and collected its first major external recognition two years later. The arc from impulse purchase to 25-hectare organic estate with a guide-awarded white wine ran in under a decade.

Vineyards And Cellar

The estate farms 25 hectares under certified organic management. The founding Carinyena vines sit on the original 6-hectare parcel acquired in September 2017, and it is from those vines that El Tracte is made. Carinyena, the grape known in French as Carignan, is the dominant red variety across the estate. Garnacha Blanca covers the white wine ground.

Organic farming on Montsant's thin, fast-draining soils tends to produce low yields with marked fruit concentration. The decision to certify organically from the outset rather than transitioning from conventional viticulture reflects a founding commitment rather than a later conversion. The 2022 winery gave the estate its own facility for the first time, allowing tighter control over harvest timing, sorting, and the ageing trajectory that El Tracte's documented aging potential to 2045 requires. Detailed cellar process information, including maceration periods, oak regime, and fermentation temperatures, is not available in current sources.

Wines

The two confirmed wines in the Bell Cros range are El Tracte and La Figaflor.

El Tracte is a red wine made entirely from Carinyena grown on the original 2017 parcel. The color is deep and opaque, with a pronounced blue-black cast rather than the red-violet more typical of lighter red wines. The aromatic profile is dense: black plum, blueberry, fresh black fruits, mint, licorice, and a background thread of violets. The wine carries serious ageing architecture, with the estate citing potential to 2045 under proper storage conditions. El Tracte is a structured wine that works with food, particularly meat, and carries all the concentration associated with old Carinyena vines on mineral Montsant soils.

La Figaflor is a white wine made from Garnacha Blanca. It was named best Garnacha Blanca in La Guía de Vins de Catalunya 2024, the first major external recognition for the estate's white wine and the first notable award produced from the 2022 winery. Garnacha Blanca in Montsant tends toward full-bodied whites with aromatic richness, medium-high alcohol, and a weight that distinguishes it from Atlantic-influenced Spanish whites.

In The Glass

El Tracte opens with the deep blue-black color that marks Carinyena grown at low yields on mineral soils. The nose layers outward from concentrated black plum and blueberry into fresher top notes of mint and licorice, with violets rising from behind the fruit rather than dominating it. In the mouth, the wine is full and dense, with the grip and depth that signal a long ageing window. The finish is long, mineral-edged, and carries the slight austerity of a wine still building. Bottles opened now will show fruit and power; bottles held to the late 2030s will show greater integration.

La Figaflor's tasting profile is not detailed in current verified sources. The 2024 guide recognition for best Garnacha Blanca in Catalonia points to a white of notable quality, and Garnacha Blanca from Montsant characteristically delivers full body, layered stone-fruit and herbal aromatics, and a texture that outlasts lighter white grapes. Confirmed sensory detail will appear when a verified tasting note is available.

A Bottle To Understand It

Start with El Tracte. It is the founding wine, made from the Carinyena vines on the original parcel, and it carries the estate's story in its name: tracte is the Catalan handshake that sealed the 2017 land purchase from Joan and Maria. The wine is a deep-colored, aromatic Montsant red with black plum, blueberry, mint, and violets on the nose and the structural depth to age well past 2040. It is a serious bottle without requiring serious ceremony: open it with roasted or braised meat, drink it at cellar temperature, and hold a second bottle for five or more years to see what Carinyena from this appellation does with time.

Anecdote

On September 13, 2017, Ann and Peter Skoglund stood in a vineyard in the Montsant hills of Tarragona and shook hands with Joan and Maria, the farmers who had worked that land before them. The handshake was a tracte, the traditional Catalan form of agreement that predates written contracts and carries its own legal and cultural weight in the region. The Skoglunds were transferring 6 hectares and 4,000 kilograms of Carinyena grapes still on the vine. They were also, without fully knowing it yet, choosing a name. When the first wine came from those grapes, they called it El Tracte. Not after the vineyard, not after the valley, but after the handshake itself. That gesture between two pairs of hands in September 2017 now appears on every bottle of the estate's founding red.

Final Word

Bell Cros is a young estate with a short track record and a clear founding logic. The Skoglunds came to Montsant as outsiders, bought a valley on instinct, farmed it organically from the first year, and named their wine after the agreement that started everything. El Tracte is a deep, structured Carinyena with serious ageing potential, and La Figaflor has already collected recognition as the best Garnacha Blanca in Catalonia. The estate is early in its arc, and the wines are already worth following.

Sources

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