From Swiss cosmopolitan to organic winemaker in the Andes
Dieter Meier was born in Zurich in 1945 and has lived many lives: conceptual artist, poet, film director, writer, actor, restaurateur — and since the late 1990s, an organic winemaker in Argentina. He became internationally known in the 1980s as the voice of the Zurich electro duo Yello. Argentina fascinated him even as a young man; at the end of the 1990s, he bought the historic Ojo de Agua ranch, including around 2,200 hectares of land in the Argentine pampas, and shortly thereafter began to practice viticulture and cattle breeding according to ecological principles. The vineyards in Mendoza, Patagonia, and Salta followed. Since 2023, his children Eleonore, Anna, Sophie, and Francis have been running the winery — the family character inherent in the name Dieter Meier & Family Wines is thus meant literally.
Biodynamic conviction, Andean ice, and minimal intervention in the cellar
The heart of production lies in Agrelo Alto, south of the city of Mendoza, at an altitude of around 1,000 meters at the foot of the Andes. The soils there are stony, mineral-rich, and poor — ideal for deep-rooted vines that have to fight for concentration. During the five-month ripening period, there is no rain; the vineyards are supplied exclusively with meltwater from the Andes via drip irrigation. All wines carry organic certification and are vegan; chemical interventions in the vineyard and cellar are consistently avoided. In the cellar, the grapes are fermented in stainless steel tanks at controlled temperatures after the harvest in mid-April; for the structured cuvées, aging follows in French oak barrels, some of which are second-fill, so as not to hide the fruit behind wood aromas. The cellar work is managed by a team led by cellar master Marcelo Pelleriti and Chief Winemaker Mauricio López, who has been with the company since 2014.
Dieter Meier's vision can be summarized in one sentence: „Our goal is to produce the best organic wines in the world — and that is possible in Argentina!
