Catena Agrelo Cabernet Sauvignon

The Catena story began in 1898, when Nicola Catena emigrated from Italy to Argentina and planted his first vineyard in Mendoza in 1902. His grandson, Nicolás Catena Zapata, transformed the family business in the 1980s. After a stint as a visiting professor at UC Berkeley and time spent in Napa, he returned convinced that Argentina could make world-class wine. He pushed his vineyards higher into the Andes foothills in pursuit of cooler conditions, pioneering high-altitude viticulture in Mendoza. His daughter, Laura Catena, founded the Catena Institute of Wine in 1995 to study the country’s terroirs scientifically. The family’s Mayan-inspired pyramid winery opened in Agrelo in 2001. The
Appellation series was created to spotlight individual districts of Mendoza. Agrelo lies in Luján de Cuyo, the historic heart of Mendoza winemaking, at roughly 950 to 1,050 meters above sea level. Compared with much of Mendoza’s rocky alluvial ground, its soils are deeper and richer in clay, which holds water and gives the wines a supple, generous texture. Mendoza is a high desert with only about eight inches of rain a year, sitting in the rain shadow of the Andes. Viticulture here has always depended on water from mountain snowmelt, channeled through irrigation canals first built by the Indigenous Huarpe people and later expanded by Spanish colonists, who planted vines after founding the city in 1561. The arrival of the railway in 1885 brought waves of Italian and Spanish immigrants who built the modern industry. At altitude, the thin air brings intense sunlight and high UV, which thickens grape skins, while dramatic swings between day and night temperatures preserve freshness. Growers also contend with hail and the Zonda, a hot, dry wind that
sweeps down from the mountains.