Winemaking
We must not confuse hands-off oenology with lack of oenology. Wine is just a moment in time between must and vinegar, and without human knowledge and experience, it is impossible to talk about wine and especially great wines that express their terroir. Then comes into play the sensitivity of the real winemakers, those who intervene only as necessary so that the wines are transparent to the terroir. The worst intervention is non-intervention!
At Domínio do Açor, we respect the traditions of the Dão whenever possible, such as the use of granite “lagares” for red wines, the indigenous yeasts from our vineyards, the use of oak barrels in both white and red wines. The choice of wood, for us, is of extreme importance, and for this reason we only work with the best cooperages in the world, and within these, with their best ranges, always favouring larger sizes (400, 500 litres and botti): Atelier Centre France, Dussiaux, Stockinger, François Frères, Damy, Tremeaux, Ermitage, Taransaud, Garbellotto... The proportion of new barrels is very small within the total.
Our philosophy is that wood is really fundamental for a living wine to interact with the world, it serves to texturize and prolong the aftertaste, to give that precise note of reduction and/or oxidation, but never to spice up the wine with vanilla, coconut, clove and praline, distorting the sound of the voice of the earth. The Dão is one of the best wine regions in the world in potential to consubstantiate elegance with minerality.
With the words of our winemaker Luís Lopes
"I think it is fundamental, with the years in the Domínio do Açor, that we get to know each plot to the point of previously designing future labels, for example, as this year we vinified the Touriga Nacional with Alfrocheiro in the “lagares”, in co-fermentation, we take a risk that this blend will work out well in the end, and in the result, all the material will already be integrated, with no need for subsequent blends of wines. A bit like how we approach the Vinha Velha. I think one of the goals of our work is to "predict" the plots and co-ferment, so that more and more oenology is to support the process and not an oenology based on making final batches before bottling"
"Our oenology wants to be based on the principles of regular ripening of the grapes, with normally gentle fermentations, playing with some percentage of stalks or whole-clusters, not assuming rules, but experimenting with each grape variety and plot in each year. We find the use of sulphur fundamental, and work in homeopathic doses, so that the ageing or bottling is not compromised by a deficit or excess of this useful compound. However, a "reductive" oenology calls for low concentrations of sulphur without compromising quality or making sensory hindrance to the profiles."
"To achieve the translation of the terroir, it is fundamental to have a transparent oenology (without adornments, without the large part of possible oenological products), and even knowing that all practice can intervene in the pattern of a terroir, an oenology based on simplicity, on the daily tasting of the juices for the decision making of the harvest, of the musts for the monitoring and path to take before each fermentation, and then in the aging, the type and characteristic of the container used."
"To closely and frequently follow the life of each wine is the way we learn from them and, from the first days in the vineyard, we establish a scenario for its fermentation, ageing and realisation. If from the vineyard we make our blends, to our customer it will be easier and more perceptible the translation and information of the work we are doing for each bottle"
OUR SPECIALISTS
Régisseur,
Guilherme Corrêa
Guilherme Corrêa is Brazilian from Belo Horizonte, graduated in economy by UFMG (Federal University of Minas Gerais). He inaugurated the profession of sommelier in the state of Minas in 1995, at the restaurant Vecchio Sogno. In 2000 he became the first Brazilian sommelier to perform his formation abroad, at the Associazione Italiana Sommeliers, in its territorial section of Tuscany. He became the Brazilian champion of sommeliers in two occasions in which he competed in the contest, in 2006 and 2009. He was also the best sommelier of all Latin America and 3rd place overall in the Ist "Best Sommelier of the Americas" of the Association de la Sommellerie Internationale, in 2009 in Argentina. Elected by Meininger's Wine Business International magazine the "Best Sommelier" of Brazil in its Who's Who section in 2009, Guilherme received in London the Diploma Certificate in the WSET® Wines and Spirit Education Trust (Pass with Merit). By the same WSET®, he also qualified as a Certified Educator.
Guilherme has a long experience in sommellerie, wine education, commerce and importation - he is still a partner of one of the most traditional Brazilian importers, Decanter Vinhos, and "wine director" of the distributor Temple Wines de Portugal - and in wine communication, as an article writer and wine taster for Revista de Vinhos de Portugal and Gula do Brasil. However, to crown his almost 30-year career in the wine industry, he was still missing the most precious jewel in his collection: to participate directly in the elaboration of great whites and reds of elegance, terroir and minerality, the predicates of wine that he has always defended in his professional career.
Now, as "régisseur" of Domínio do Açor, a concept as burgundian as "domaine", and with a team of partners and colleagues of great experience and talent by his side, he has everything in his hands to extract from this fabulous terroir wines that will fulfil his ultimate dream, that will delight wine-lovers and professionals, and that will enhance the value of the Dão region and his beloved Portugal.
* régisseur: in Burgundy domaines, the régisseur participates in their management and strategic orientation, getting involved in all matters of production, marketing and commercialisation of the wines.
Consultant winemaker
Luís Lopes
Originally from the limestone soils of northern Ribatejo, from a family who are also producers, he started his oenology degree at UTAD (Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro) in 2003. Luís finished his degree in 2007 and left for Burgundy to further his interests in biodynamics and integrative winemaking. After an internship with Dominique Lafon in Comtes Lafon, in the company of a New Zealand colleague, he accepted an invitation, after returning to Portugal to work with his family on the Alveirão project, to work at Martinborough Vineyards. He went there in 2009, where he accompanied a Pinot Noir harvest with all that the New and Old World has to offer. The good relationships continued to have an effect, and as his housemate was a German producer, after a return to Portugal for a traineeship at Quinta da Pellada, he went to Gunderloch in Rheinhessen. On his return to Portugal, still in 2009, he joined Quinta da Pellada for 8 harvests of much practice and learning. Along the way, he started supporting António Madeira's project and Quinta das Marias, and has been a consultant until today, and is in charge of an exciting project in Spain, led by Bodegas Alvear de Montilla. Still, since 2013, he makes some wines for himself, creating the Moreish brand.
Luís Lopes' track record in the Dão, working on iconic projects such as Quinta da Pellada, António Madeira and Quinta das Marias, coupled with his experiences in the Old and New World, in biodynamics and terroir wines, add up to direct Domínio do Açor to where we want it to go: to be a benchmark for wines of elegance, typicity and minerality from Dão and Portugal.
Resident winemaker-viticulturist,
João Costa
Born in Dão, always with a connection to family farming, he decided to follow as an academic path Organic Agriculture at ESA (Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra - Coimbra Agricultural School) in 2011. As an end of course internship, he worked for 3 months in Alba (University of Turin), in laboratory and viticulture, where he gained even more passion for the world of wines and pushed him to follow to the master's degree in viticulture and oenology at the ISA in Lisbon. Between these courses and afterwards, he worked in vineyards and wineries in Switzerland - Johaniterkeller, and in Portugal - Humus Wines and Quinta da Serradinha. All these experiences enhanced his sensitivity towards wines with minimal intervention, the pure expression of the terroir. He carried out grape harvests in Alentejo at Herdade de São Miguel, in the Douro at Niepoort, in Lisbon at Quinta da Serradinha and also in Switzerland at Johaniterkeller. Recently he worked at Quinta da Lomba (Niepoort), in the Dão region, just before embracing this great project at Domínio do Açor.
João infects everyone with his charisma and passion for agriculture and terroir wines. On a day to day basis at Domínio do Açor, he is a fundamental part of our vineyard overflowing with life and our winery channelling all this energy into our wines.