The winery will be used to produce its iconic wine Purgatori, from the Costers del Segre DO
Bodegas Torres will build a winery in Lleida, at its vineyard in L’Aranyó in the heart of Les Garrigues, to produce Purgatori. This is the only Torres wine from the DO of Costers del Segre and from which an initial limited production was launched for high-end restaurants in 2015.
The winery will cover an area of 1,650 m2 and will be located on the grounds of the historic 18th-century farmhouse Mas de L’Aranyó, owned by the Torres family since 1999. The new edifice will be constructed with fine materials to preserve the appearance of the original farmhouse, formed by two buildings of different heights with an L-shaped layout and by small, adjacent constructions, totalling 2,800 m2.
The project, recently approved by Lleida’s Urban Planning Commission, also envisages the landscaping of the outer courtyard and the second-phase restoration of the historic buildings, which will be used for olive oil production and wine tourism. Construction of the winery will begin in September and is expected to finish by the end of summer 2017, to enable production of the fifth vintage of Purgatori, a wine with a Mediterranean style made from the varieties Garnacha, Cariñena and Syrah from the vineyard itself.
As a curiosity, it is worth highlighting, that the new winery will be connected underground to the one used by the monks in former times to make wine. The L’Aranyó farmhouse, built in 1770 by the Abbey of Montserrat, was popularly known as the “farmhouse of the exiled”. It was home to monks who had been sent to this remote location with extreme climate conditions to work the land and provide the monastery with grain and wine.
After buying the property, located in the municipality of Juneda, Bodegas Torres began planting the vineyard, while preserving the century-old olive trees. The farm covers an area of about 800 hectares, 175 of which are devoted to the vineyard, spread between the hillside and the valley, at an altitude of 550 meters at its highest point. The area’s extreme weather conditions, typical of a continental climate, help the vineyard to yield high-quality fruit, once it has adapted to the terroir.
The new winery at L’Aranyó will be the Torres family’s fourth winery in Catalonia. The family has two others in the Penedès and another in the Priorat region, as well as another three wineries in the wine regions of La Rioja, Rueda and Ribera del Duero.
