Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Very brash, ripe and dark toasted spices here. Plenty of oak. The fruit is in the ripe, dark-plum zone. On the palate, there’s a wealth of rich, dark chocolate and roasted coffee with a smooth, supple array of fine tannins. Good freshness. Drink or hold.
The name Ramírez de la Piscina traces its lineage back to the Navarra Kings who fought in the First Crusade during the 11th century. In early 1945, Julio Ramírez de la Piscina, followed the tradition inherited from his parents in Ábalos, and continued cultivating the family vineyards in San Vicente de la Sonsierra and began producing traditional Rioja wines. In 1961, Julio moved to Bilbao with his wife Angela and began selling his wine in the old Bodeguilla Riojana in the Plaza del Corazón de María.
In 1973, Bodegas Ramírez was officially founded and began to sell bottled wine under this name. In 1980, the fourth generation of the Ramírez de la Piscina family took over management of the winery, and in 1987, the name was changed to Bodegas Ramírez de la Piscina. The name change honors the family's historic surname, which is an ancient aristocratic Medieval Riojan name, originating from a 12th Century Romanesque church nearby the vineyards called Santa María de la Piscina.
All of the vineyards are estate owned and the vast majority of the plantings are Tempranillo on high density trellis. The oldest Tempranillo vineyards are head trained, and the family owns a few small plants of Garnacha, Viura, and Malvasia, that are used for the Rosado and Blanco. Ramirez de la Piscina champions the tradition of ageing classified, traditional styled Rioja.
Hailed as the star red variety in Spain’s most celebrated wine region, Tempranillo from Rioja, or simply labeled, “Rioja,” produces elegant wines with complex notes of red and black fruit, crushed rock, leather, toast and tobacco, whose best examples are fully capable of decades of improvement in the cellar.
Rioja wines are typically a blend of fruit from its three sub-regions: Rioja Alta, Rioja Alavesa and Rioja Oriental, although specific sub-region (zonas), village (municipios) and vineyard (viñedo singular) wines can now be labeled. Rioja Alta and Alavesa, at the highest elevations, are considered to be the source of the brightest, most elegant fruit, while grapes from the warmer and drier, Rioja Oriental, produce wines with deep color, great body and richness.