Who makes it
The family’s vineyard history at Hacienda Pradolagar begins in 1840, when Don Felipe De la Mata planted the first vineyards there. Marqués de Vargas describes its wine lineage as spanning four generations.
Pelayo de la Mata and his brothers built the winery on the family estate in Rioja Alta in 1989. The house follows a French château model, making Reservas and Gran Reservas exclusively from grapes grown in its own nearby vineyard.
Where it grows
The winery stands at Carretera Zaragoza km 6 in Logroño, La Rioja, amid its own vineyards in the Ebro Valley area known as Tres Marqueses. Hacienda Pradolagar is divided into 32 parcels by soil, climate and grape variety.
That parcel division separates the vineyard into smaller units before the grapes reach the cellar. The estate’s vines are between 33 and 50 years old and are cultivated without herbicides or pesticides.
What they make
Marqués de Vargas builds its range around Reservas and Gran Reservas made solely from estate grapes. The Rioja winery also produces three limited production single vineyard red wines, bringing narrow vineyard bottlings into the wider ageing program.
Marqués de Vargas Rioja Gran Reserva 2016 is a red single estate wine composed of 85% Tempranillo, 10% Mazuelo and 5% Garnacha. Its maturation combines French oak with a smaller proportion of American oak during the second ageing phase.