Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
The ripe fruit comes through here with dried strawberry, cherry and rose petal. Full body, purity of fruit, velvety tannins and a long and flavorful finish. Fruit-driven yet subtle and reserved. No new oak maturation yet spent 24 months in barrel. Drink or hold.
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Wine Enthusiast
Ripe, cool, earthy black-fruit aromas of plum and cassis are accented by notes of leather and animal. This warm-vintage Rioja feels chunky and good, while ripe, loamy flavors of black plum and cassis finish mellow and with a touch of oak-based lemon peel. Drink through 2021.
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Wine Spectator
Smoky and toasty notes frame black cherry, licorice and espresso flavors in this polished red. The light, firm tannins are well-integrated and crisp acidity keeps this fresh. Supple, graceful and balanced. Drink now through 2022. 17,000 cases made.
Contino, the first Rioja château 1973, impelled by CVNE and the owners of the 62-hectare property located in the Rioja Alavesa. The history of the property dates from the 16th century, and is reflected in its name. The “contino” was the officer in charge of a guard corps of a hundred soldiers who protected the royal family "de contino” (continuously) from the times of the Catholic Monarchs onwards. According to the tradition, Saint Gregory, the patron saint of vineyards, passed through the lands of this same Rioja property, giving rise to the use of his figure in the logo of this winery, and to the use of his name for some of the plots now planted with vines. The wine produced on this property, fruity and elegant, is heir to the best Rioja tradition. It is made with an individualised grape harvesting system in which only grapes from the same vineyards that surround the old manor house are used. Their origin in the various plots is noted. The perfect combination of soils, Atlantic-Mediterranean climate and refined technique have made Contino, more than 30 years after the first vintage, a reference product both in and outside Spain. The 62 hectares of Laserna vineyards in Laguardia are protected by the hill called the Cerro de la Mesa, which gives this land a characteristic orientation and mesoclimate. The hand-cut grapes are transported along a short road to the outbuildings so as to avoid damaging their qualities.
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.