AALTO

As the man who was, for thirty years, behind one of Spain’s most iconic wines, Vega Sicilia, Mariano Garcia’s position as one of the country’s most highly regarded winemakers is beyond dispute.

Together with Javier Zaccagnini, former head of Ribera del Duero’s regulatory body, he is now the brainchild behind the sleekly modern Aalto winery that sits within the region. Thus, the person who knows where the best grapes are and the person who knows how to make them sing get together. How fortuitous.

Seductive, magical, astoundingly concentrated wines derived from very old vineyards, uniformly excellent and in limited quantities.

He was born in Valbuena de Duero (Valladolid, Spain) on March, 28th 1944. He began his work as a winemaker in the mid 1960’s. He studied at the Madrid School of Winemaking and Viticulture and made his first vintage at Vega Sicilia in 1968. In that year, he began to work as the main winemaker of this winery. He started the Alion winery in 1991 and continued to work at Vega Sicilia as technical director until 1998. In the 1970’s, he completed his oenological education by attending various courses and seminars. From 1980 he travelled regularly, visiting numerous wine regions around the world. He has been adviser to the Mauro Group since its creation in 1980, and in 1998, he became director and winemaker of the company. As a winemaker, Mariano rigorously controls the yields, respecting to the maximum the grapes and preserves the entire characteristics of the terroir and the variey, extracting fruit and mature tannins during the vinification, with the philosophy of obtaining full bodied, longeval wines but, at the same time fine, elegant and complex.