Penedès reinvents itself

10 subzones in the Catalan wine region of Penedès

A look at developments in a particularly significant Catalan wine region, and its most important producer. 

In April I had a meeting with the outgoing president of the DO Penedès Josep Maria Albet i Noya and Miguel Torres Maczassek, director general of Torres, the dominant wine company in the region, now styled Familia Torres. 

The Catalan wine establishment, for so long dominated by the two big Cava companies Codorniu and Freixenet, is still reeling from seeing both of them sold off in the space of remarkably few months, to Carlisle investment group and Henkell of Germany respectively.

Albet i Noya, of...