Garage Wine began quite literally in Pilar and Derek’s garage in 2001. After half a dozen vintages making wine for an informal market of family and friends the firm was featured in Chile’s El Mercurio newspaper in an article dedicated to the growing grassroots movement of small wine. The firm was referred to as “that Garage Wine Company” and it was too late to change the name, and time to forge an enterprise. GWCo makes a series of small Lots that are 8 -17 barrels each and include a Cab Franc and Cab Sauv blend, mountain-grown in the Maipo, and a series of dry-farmed Mediterranean field-blends that include Carignan, Garnacha, Mataró & Cinsualt grown on centuries-old rootstock with small farmers in the Maule and Itata. Each wine is from a different place: Caliboro, Sauzal, Truquilemu, Portezuelo – a separate parcel of 1-2 hectares belonging to a small farmer who works with horse and plough as his family has done pretty much since colonial times. The wines are about place not varietal, nor consumer. All of the wines are made by hand with native yeasts in small tanks, punched down manually and pressed out in a small basket press. (Students of Alvaro’s, today head of Oenology at the University of Chile, do help with some of the grunt work.) GWCo is still very much a DIY operation towing the crop back to the winery in a trailer behind a trusty pickup 2,ooo kilos at a time. Total Production: almost 8,ooo cases
