1972: An acronym that thinks of a region as a whole
Bodegas LAN was founded in 1972 in Fuenmayor — right in the heart of the Rioja Alta, a few minutes from Logroño. The name is no coincidence: LAN stands for the initial letters of the three provinces that historically span the DOCa Rioja — Logroño, Álava and Navarra. Behind this is an attitude: Rioja is not a uniform landscape, but a mosaic of soils, altitudes and winegrowing traditions. Founded by a group of entrepreneurs from the Basque Country who traveled through Rioja and were attracted by its vineyards, its cuisine and its hospitality, LAN pursued an approach from the very beginning that does not see tradition and curiosity as a contradiction. Since 2012, the winery has belonged to the Portuguese Sogrape group, which has given it international reach without changing the character of the house.
The heart of the winery is Viña Lanciano: 72 hectares of its own property, divided into 22 individual parcels, which lie at an altitude of 450 to 550 meters in a spectacular river loop of the Ebro — exactly on the border between Rioja Alta and Rioja Alavesa. Anyone who has seen the location understands why the founders considered it the core of their project: the Sierra Cantabria at their backs, the Ebro as a natural temperature regulator, stony Canto-rodado soils with low yields and vines up to 60 years old.
Sustainable viticulture and an idiosyncratic cellar management
In the vineyard, LAN avoids chemical herbicides, pesticides and synthetic fertilizers. Organic material is returned to the soils, natural greening and ecological corridors promote biodiversity — birds, insects, reptiles and small mammals are part of the vineyard ecosystem, not disruptive factors. For LAN, protecting this diversity is not a marketing strategy, but a prerequisite for the quality of the grapes. Part of the Viña Lanciano — the five-hectare Mantible eco-plot — is managed entirely organically and produces exclusively certified organic wine.
In the cellar, cellar master and technical director María Barúa leads the winemaking. Her trademark is a consistently differentiated approach to wood: instead of putting all wines through the same barrel, LAN relies on French, Russian, Hungarian and hybrid barriques — the latter with American staves and French heads, an in-house development. Each wine matures in the wood that best reflects its origin and structure, not the other way around. The fully air-conditioned, automated barrel storage allows for precise control over every single barrique.
Tempranillo as the focal point — classically matured, contemporarily interpreted
The range follows the classic Rioja aging hierarchy: Crianza, Reserva and Gran Reserva, plus single-vineyard and premium wines from Viña Lanciano. Tempranillo is the focus, flanked by the indigenous varieties Graciano, Mazuelo and Garnacha. The wines show ripe, fruit-driven aromas — dark berries, cherry, spices — with a structure built up by long barrel aging that never feels harsh. The organic Crianza from the Mantible plot ferments with natural yeasts and matures for 14 months in new French oak, which gives it more freshness and precision than classic Rioja Crianzas on American wood. Anyone who wants to understand the entire spectrum should reach for the Reserva from Viña Lanciano: Tempranillo, Graciano and Mazuelo, aged in French and Hungarian oak — a wine that shows how much depth a single vineyard can yield if you take it seriously.
