From the atlas
Bodegas y Viñedos Artadi
At A Glance
Location: Laguardia and Elvillar de Álava, Rioja Alavesa, Álava, Basque Country, Spain Grapes: Tempranillo (red), Viura (white) Vineyards: 56 hectares at the foot of the Sierra de Toloño Farming: Organic; no synthetic pesticides or fertilisers Ownership: Lacalle and Laorden families, since 1992 Denomination: Vinos de la Tierra de Álava (withdrew from Rioja DOCa in 2015)
The Producer
Artadi farms 56 hectares of Tempranillo in Rioja Alavesa and bottles every drop outside the Rioja denomination. The Lacalle and Laorden families, who took full ownership in 1992, built Artadi into one of the most discussed addresses in the subzone, then in 2015 walked away from the Rioja DOCa name entirely. The wines that carry the estate's highest-regarded parcels, including the old-vine single-vineyard El Pisón, now appear on shelves labelled Vinos de la Tierra de Álava rather than Rioja DOCa.
The core range is Tempranillo-driven: village-level blends, old-vine cuvées, and single-parcel expressions from around Laguardia and Elvillar de Álava. A small volume of white wine from Viura completes the range. Organic farming has been the estate baseline since the family took control, with no synthetic inputs used across any of the 56 hectares.
Place
Laguardia sits in Rioja Alavesa, the northern subzone of Rioja, which falls administratively within the Álava province of the Basque Country rather than the Rioja region to the south. The distinction matters for the wine: Rioja Alavesa sits at higher elevation than the Rioja Alta and Rioja Baja subzones, sheltered to the north by the Cantabrian mountains and by the Sierra de Toloño range directly above Artadi's vineyards. That shelter holds Atlantic weather at bay during summer, giving warm days with cooler nights than lower-elevation Rioja. The result for Tempranillo is slower, more even ripening: fruit that reaches full colour and flavour without losing the acidity that keeps a wine alive across years.
Rioja Alavesa Tempranillo has a reputation for aromatic lift and relative freshness compared to the fuller, more extracted style more common further south. The altitude and the north-facing shelter of the Sierra de Toloño are two reasons. Artadi's specific sites around Laguardia and Elvillar de Álava sit at the foot of that range, and the estate has not moved beyond the 56 hectares officially reported on the Artadi website, despite third-party sources citing larger figures.
Since 2015 the wines carry the Vinos de la Tierra de Álava label rather than Rioja DOCa. An Artadi bottle will not say Rioja on the front label, even though it was grown and made in Rioja Alavesa.
Soil And Site
The vineyards sit on a layered mix of chalky earth, alluvial gravel, silt, and clay. Chalky soils drain water readily and force vines to push roots deeper for moisture, a condition that tends to moderate vigour and concentrate berry flavour. Alluvial gravel adds further drainage and warms through the day, contributing to even ripening across the growing season. Silt and clay provide some water retention in dry summers. The estate describes the combination as nutrient-poor, which in practical terms means low natural yields, smaller berries, and more concentrated juice.
The Sierra de Toloño looms directly above the vineyards, providing both altitude shelter and the geological material that defines Rioja Alavesa soils more broadly: limestone-influenced terrain with a mix of drainage characteristics that vary parcel by parcel across the 56 hectares.
Story
Artadi began in 1985 as a cooperative of eleven local growers in Rioja Alavesa. The cooperative model was common in Spanish winemaking at the time: growers pooled fruit, shared equipment, and sold wine under a collective label without the capital or commercial infrastructure for independent bottling. By 1992, the Lacalle and Laorden families had taken full ownership and redirected the project toward something the cooperative arrangement had not allowed: single-vineyard farming, parcel-specific vinification, and estate bottling.
That shift defined the next two decades. Artadi developed a reputation for old-vine Tempranillo from identified parcels, a practice that was far from universal in Rioja at the time. The estate's highest-regarded wine, El Pisón, came from a single old-vine vineyard in Laguardia and drew critical attention that established Artadi as one of the leading addresses in the subzone.
In 2015 the family made a second consequential decision. Artadi formally withdrew from the Rioja DOCa, citing regulatory constraints that conflicted with the estate's approach to vineyard sourcing and terroir-honest labelling. Every wine in the range was relabelled as Vinos de la Tierra de Álava. The Rioja name, one of the most commercially recognisable in Spanish wine, disappeared from every Artadi bottle.
Vineyards And Cellar
Organic farming across all 56 hectares means no synthetic pesticides, no synthetic fertilisers, and a managed approach to soil biodiversity. For vine health, organic management generally allows more natural microbial activity in the soil, supports root development, and avoids residue buildup in the vine system. For fruit character, lower intervention in the vineyard tends to produce smaller berries with more concentrated juice and greater aromatic expression.
The estate separates parcels during vinification rather than blending everything into a single vat early. Parcel-specific vinification, which allows winemakers to assess each plot independently before deciding on blending or bottling, is central to range architecture at Artadi. The cellar uses French oak for ageing; specific cooperages, barrel sizes, and ageing durations by cuvée are not documented in available sources.
Wines
The range is built on Tempranillo across three tiers. The entry point is a village-level red, now labelled under Vinos de la Tierra de Álava following the 2015 DOCa exit, sourced from younger and broader parcels around Laguardia. Expect firm cherry fruit, moderate tannin, and enough acidity to drink with food or develop modestly over three to five years.
Pagos Viejos is the old-vine village-level tier: Tempranillo from older parcels across the Laguardia area. The older vine age reduces natural yield and concentrates flavour, producing a wine with deeper colour, more dried herb and dark fruit character, firmer tannin, and a longer finish than the entry red. It is the main workhorse of the range.
El Pisón is the single-vineyard flagship, from an old-vine parcel in Laguardia with a reputation for producing some of the most concentrated Tempranillo in the subzone. Production is small, price is high, and the wine needs time: at least five years from vintage, more in good years. It sits at the far end of the range in both price and ageing demand.
Artadi also produces a white wine from Viura, made in small volume. Viura in Rioja Alavesa tends to produce wines with medium body, citrus and stone fruit, and firm acidity. The Artadi white is a minor part of the range by volume.
In The Glass
Artadi Tempranillo from Rioja Alavesa opens with red cherry, dried rosemary and a faint earthy note that comes with altitude-grown fruit rather than the warmer, more confected cherry of lower-elevation Rioja. In the mouth, the wines show firm but not grippy tannin, a quality that comes from the chalky limestone-influenced soils and from organic farming that pushes the vine toward smaller, thicker-skinned berries. The acidity is present without being aggressive, providing a clean line through the mid-palate and keeping the fruit fresh rather than heavy.
At Pagos Viejos level, the fruit deepens from fresh cherry toward dried plum and iron, and the mid-palate adds density without losing the aromatic lift that separates Rioja Alavesa from the broader Rioja style. El Pisón builds further on this: more concentrated, more tannic, and with a finish that adds bay leaf and graphite alongside the dark fruit. The altitude character persists even at the top of the range: these are not warm, sweet, overly extracted Riojas.
A Bottle To Understand It
Pagos Viejos is the right first bottle. It is old-vine Tempranillo from Laguardia parcels, labelled Vinos de la Tierra de Álava, with organic farming, acidity shaped by altitude, firm cherry and dried herb fruit, tannin from genuinely old vines, and a long finish. It is more concentrated and expressive than the entry-level red and far more accessible in price and availability than El Pisón. Drink it from three years after vintage, or hold it for five to six. It is the bottle that shows what the family has been building in these parcels since 1992.
Anecdote
In 2015 the Lacalle and Laorden families told the Rioja Denominación de Origen Calificada that Artadi would no longer use its name. This was not a quiet administrative decision. Rioja is one of the most recognised labels in Spanish wine, and the DOCa designation carries commercial weight that no Vinos de la Tierra regional label can match in export markets. The family's argument was specific: the DOCa's regulations prevented them from farming and labelling their wines in the way they believed the vineyards required. Rather than work within those rules, they stripped the Rioja name from every bottle in the range, including El Pisón, which had been praised under the Rioja DOCa for years. Shelves that had carried Artadi Rioja DOCa now carried Artadi Vinos de la Tierra de Álava. The bottles were the same wine, grown in the same place, made by the same family. The name on the front label was gone.
Final Word
Artadi is the Rioja Alavesa estate that gave up Rioja. The 56 hectares below the Sierra de Toloño still produce Tempranillo on chalky limestone soils, and the family still farms them organically as they have since taking ownership in 1992. What changed in 2015 is the label, and with it the estate's public position: a voluntary exit from the most commercially powerful name in Spanish wine, in exchange for freedom from the appellation rules.
Sources
- https://artadi.com/en/
- https://artadi.com/en/vineyards
- https://artadi.com/en/history/