F.A.Q

Frequently asked questions

Why is the varietal on the fourth line down?
Each wine’s varieties are printed on the label, but further down because what is important for us is not the variety but the origin, that is to say, the place / parcel from where it comes.

Labels
Why stencils and silk screening? And why wax?

When we began bottling wine in 2001 there was no digital printing and short runs of 500 labels were prohibitively expensive. So we learned to paint / silk-screen bottles. Luis our bottle painter has been with us for fifteen years now.

When a capsule company insisted we bought 1o,ooo or nothing we sought another solution. A small school supplies / crayon manufacturer had wax that served to seal and was food grade certified. As he was there for us without a minimum and all the colours we wanted we have never given up on him. Today many buy his wax large medium and small.

We export most of our production to 16 countries around the world and distribute in Chile directly with help from Alan Grundsky & Ricardo Grellet.

Nota sobre compra en Chile:

Garage Wine Co. elabora poco vino y la mayoria de las botellas se va por afuera pedido con anticipación y con allocation. En 2016 empezamos a distrubuir en Chile directo con algo de ayuda de Alan Grundsky y Ricardo Grellet. Eso dicho si nos contacta directo si vendemos directo por caja de 6 como minimo especialmente durante las epocas del año cuando estamos embotellando — para levantar fondos para botellas y corchos!

Garage Wine Co.  in other people’s words

Wine Advocate – Robert Parker ,#222  Dec 2015

I sat down to taste through an exciting collection of wines with Derek Mossman. Garage Wine Co produces wines from Maipo and Maule, and their trademark is wines with great freshness and acidity from some seven vineyards they work. 42,000 bottles per year of highly personal and full of character wines. I later met with Mossman again to walk some of the vineyards for where he sources grapes for some of his Maule cuvées and the work he’s doing there to support the local ‘huasos’ and their vineyards is remarkable. The common thing that I’ve seen between Mossman, Cancino, Luyt, Parra working in the south is respect — for the people, the traditions and the places. These are wines of respect. An exciting project to keep in mind.

Wine Advocate – Robert Parker, #230  Apr 2017

The wines from garage Wine Co. are divided into two simple categories: One Winter Wines — aged for one winter before bottling and Two Winter Wines– aged for two winters before bottling! The former are simple, fresh and quaffable wines with good acidity; the latter have more depth but always keeping the freshness and especially the character of the vintage, the grapes and the places where they are grown. A name to follow, among the most exciting in Chile. Tasting the whole range with Derek Mossman is one of the highlights of my Chilean report every year. Fun and exciting wines.

Descorchados nota sobre GWCo.

La primera cosecha sumó apenas dos barricas y la bebieron entre los amigos, algunos de ellos incluso compraron parte de esa producción. Hoy hacen unas 45 mil botellas de once vinos distintos, cada uno de parcelas definidas. De hecho, Mossman define Garage Wine Co. como una gestión que, desde su génesis, tuvo su foco en parcelas más que en cepas. “La gracia siempre fue separar las cosas y comparar. De ahí vienen los Lot” –dice Mossman. La filosofía de vinificación es simple. Más que vinos naturales, Mossman define a los suyos como “originarios”, inspirados en la sabiduría campesina, pero con aportes de conocimientos modernos de enología. El origen de sus parcelas o “Lot” comienza en Alto Maipo, pero después extendieron su interés a otras zonas, especialmente en el Maule, que es de donde viene gran parte de su catálogo. Se trata de carignanes de viejas parras en una zona muy cercana a la costa, sobre suelos graníticos. Este vino, como todos los tintos de Garage en la línea Lot y en Vigno, se cría por “dos inviernos” en barricas, las más nuevas de tres años de uso. “Cuando vas a comprar vinos por la zona, los viejos te dicen que el vino que lleva dos inviernos de crianza es el mejor” –dice Mossman. El resultado es el tinto clásico que se necesita para refrescar una tarde de asado con los amigos. Su acidez es intensa, pero también su lado terroso y su textura punzante.

Wine Advocate – Robert Parker, Best of 2017 – 14 Dec 2017 Luis Gutiérrez

Traveling south in Chile, I loved the wines produced with dry-farmed Cariñena and País from the day I discovered them. They are not your stereotype of Carménère or Cabernet Sauvignon that many might have in mind. One wine that stands out among those was the 2014 Truquilemu Vineyard produced by Garage Wine Co., the project belonging to Derek Mossman Knapp, Pilar Miranda and Alvaro Peña in the Secano Interior part of Maule, close to Empedrado. It’s one of nine single vineyard bottlings they produce, from an old plot belonging to the Orellana family. Truquilemu is perhaps the freshest corner of the Maule Secano, where reds just manage to ripen on the coastal mountain range that is much older than the Andes. Soils are granitic and sub-soils have cracked granite that allows roots to get deep into cracks. They use ancestral farming methods, cultivating vineyards by hand and horse. It’s mostly Cariñena and a little Monastrell (or Mataró) produced in a very simple way, fermented with natural yeasts and aged in used barrels over two winters. It has incredible freshness with notes of blood orange peel and wild herbs—floral, suggestive, harmonious and elegant. The palate is elegant—an elegant rusticity, I used to say—and shows vibrant acidity, it’s very balanced and incredibly tasty. They also selected a number of barrels from this same vineyard to make their Vigno bottling.

For Pre-releases / Library Releases  and Verticals see here.

Not everything is there but we are trying to dig backwards.