History Rafael Palacios
Rafael Palacios is the youngest brother of Alvaro Palacios, famous for his Priorat wines. The Palacios family owns the celebrated bodega Palacios-Remondo in the small village of Alfaro (Rioja Baja), which Alvaro left in the 80's to try his luck in Priorat. Rafa is the youngest of 9 brothers and sisters; he worked as an oenologist in the family cellar in Rioja, helping to improve the “Plácet”, the estate’s white blend. This gave him the idea to go and make other great whites in Spain. After a training period in the Galician Valdeorras, he was convinced it was there he would make his great wine; with Godello, the typical white variety of the region. In 2003, he bought an old Godello vineyard in the higher part of Valdeorras, the Bibei Valley. His interest for these virtually inaccessible vineyards with low yields was partly due to the fact that the villagers did not want them anymore, because the vines needed too much work for the small revenue they could bring. Rapidly, he was able to purchase 12 hectares of these vines; then he rented a large garage and a cellar for the winemaking. In 2004, he produced his first As Sortes. His second wine, the Louro, followed one year later. Then, in 2011, came the Bolo, his entry-level wine. The first As Sortes came as a bombshell when it was released. Very rapidly, it acquired the status of a cult wine, in Spain and abroad. Since then, Rafael has also been using small quantities of Treixadura and he thinks he can go further in his quality search. His present cellar is not on par with the quality of the vines he works with and of the wines he wants to produce, but the building design for a new cellar is ready.