The basic grape variety is Tempranillo (95%) from Las Cuevas, El Palo and Las Monjas vineyards in Rodezno complemented with 5% Graciano from the Montecillo estate in Fuenmayor • We started the grape harvest with the Tempranillo and some days later we picked the Graciano in Montecillo • All the grapes were placed in small boxes and taken to the winery in refrigerated transport to preserve their integrity • Alcoholic fermentation took place in tanks • Malolactic fermentation took place spontaneously and the selected wines were transferred to American oak barrels (made in-house) with an average age of 3 years • During the three years the wines were aged, they were racked every six months.
Info
Producer:
Vintage:
2017
Country:
Spain
Region:
La Rioja
Appellation:
Rioja
Variety:
Tempranillo-Based Blend
Color:
Red
Farming Practice:
Practicing Organic
Sizes Available
| Full Bottle | ES-LRA-21-17 | 12/750ml |
Press & Reviews
James Suckling
Score
96
Date
2024-08-15
"Deep, savory nose of vanilla, mussels, graphite, iron and black pepper. Vibrant and juicy, with a medium to full body and fine-grained tannins. Lots of energy, with a long, long finish. 95% tempranillo and 5% graciano. Still quite young. Drink or hold."
Jeb Dunnuck
Score
94
Date
2025-07-31
"In previous vintages of the 2017 Vina Arana Gran Reserva, the producer used to blend Tempranillo with 5% Mazuelo. Now it™s 5% Graciano with 95% Tempranillo, aged three years in older American oak. The process delivers refined tannins and a classic structure of integrated fruit, acidity, and medium-bodied power with a lasting, gravelly mineral profile. Age 15-20 years."
Vinous
Score
94
Date
2025-05-22
"The 2017 Gran Reserva Vina Arana is 95% Tempranillo and 5% Graciano from Rioja Alta. It presents a sun-kissed profile, with moderately intense red fruit and balsamic wood aromas complemented by toffee, mild mushroom and background oak before cherry emerges later. Dry and taut with a fine-grained texture, it delivers persistent flavor with a touch of tannic grip reflecting the vintage's short cycle following a spring frost."
Decanter
Score
93
Date
2025-05-18
"Fabulously classic gran reserva with coconut and vanilla sweet oak, match by intense red berry fruits. The tannins are soft and perfectly integrated, and the palate is fresh and juicy. A classic."
Tim Atkin, MW
Score
93
Date
2025-02-27
"Julio S enz calls Arana a "starter Gran Reserva" and I don't think he's damning it with faint praise. Showing the concentration of the frost-affected 2017 vintage, this is a leafy, scented, structured cuvše of Tempranillo and 5% Graciano with balsamic complexity, vanilla and cinnamon sweetness and plenty of supporting acidity. 2025-2038"
Wine Advocate
Score
93
Date
2025-02-27
"The 2017 Vi¤a Arana Gran Reserva is their more classical bottling, produced with 95% Tempranillo and 5% Graciano, fermented in stainless steel for 16 days and matured in American oak barrels for three years, racked every six months, the two varieties separately and blended before bottling. It has contained ripeness and 14% alcohol, keeping good freshness and acidity in a challenging year. The oak is neatly integrated, and the wine is harmonious and serious, a triumph over the adverse conditions of the year, the year of the big frost. They didn't produce Vi¤a Alberdi or GR 890 that year, and part of the 890 grapes are here. It's polished and elegant, quite gentle and easy to understand for a Gran Reserva. 85,000 bottles produced. It was a shorter crop in 2017. It was bottled in January 2022."
REVIEWS FROM PAST VINTAGES
2016
James Suckling
Score
95
Date
2023-09-13
"Beautiful transparency here with fresh flowers, green tobacco, pine needles, crushed stones and sandalwood. Dark fruits in the center. Full-bodied with a wonderful balance of fruit and fine tannins as well as mineral, fresh bark and delicate purple fruit. Subtlety with energy. Youthful now and drinkable, but even better in 2026."
2016
John Gilman
Score
93
Date
2024-05-14
"The 2016 Viña Arana Gran Reserva from La Rioja Alta is a ripe wine, tipping the scales at 14.5 percent octane in this vintage, but also beautifully balanced. It is composed from a blend of ninety-five percent tempranillo and five percent graciano, with the wine raised for three years in used American oak barrels, with the average age of each cask three years of age at the outset. The bouquet is outstanding, offering up scents of black raspberries, cassis, cigar ash, cloves, fresh nutmeg, woodsmoke, a lovely base of soil, nutskin and coconutty American oak. On the palate the wine is pure, focused and full-bodied, with lovely depth of fruit, fine soil inflection, ripe, buried tannins and a long, tangy, complex and impeccably balanced finish. This is a lovely bottle of old school Rioja that is already drinking quite nicely at age eight, but it has a fine structural chassis and decades and decades of life ahead of it. 2024-2075."
2016
Wine Advocate
Score
93
Date
2024-03-22
"The 2016 Viña Arana Gran Reserva is an elegant blend of Tempranillo with 5% Graciano matured in used American oak barrels for three years. During this time, the wine was manually racked from barrel to barrel, with the help of a candle, six times. It's ripe at 14.5% alcohol, with pungent notes of forest floor and truffles, dark spices and an earthy touch. It has a powerful palate, with very good freshness and acidity, reflecting the cooler year. It has some tannins that would welcome food. 60,000 bottles produced. It was bottled in July 2021."
2016
Jancis Robinson
Score
17.5+
Date
2024-04-26
"Mature notes of coffee and black chocolate layer over the very savoury dark fruit; yet there is also tons of freshness, and the tannins are very elegantly integrated. The perfumed finish goes on forever. (FG)"
Decanter
Score
96
Date
2020-08-23
"Arana commemorates one of La Rioja Alta's historic families. The Tempranillo (95%) and Graciano (5%) are aged separately in American oak barrels for three years before blending, then for three years in bottle (two years less than the 904, and six years less than the 890). The winery's keynote to this Rioja is 'freshness'. I agree."
James Suckling
Score
96
Date
2021-01-14
James Suckling
Score
95
Date
2021-08-17
"Aromas of dark plum, raspberry, mocha, mushroom, chocolate, mocha, coconut and cigar box. Full-bodied with ripe, fine tannins and bright acidity. Balanced and supple with a velvety texture. Coffee notes on the long, succulent finish. 95% tempranillo and 5% graciano. Drink or hold."
Vinous
Score
93
Date
2021-04-21
"Limpid ruby-red. Oak-spiced cherry, black raspberry, candied rose, spicecake and coconut aromas show very good definition and pick up tobacco and licorice notes as the wine opens up. Smooth and appealingly sweet, offering sappy cherry cola, fruitcake, coconut and floral pastille flavors complemented by an earthy undertone. Shows very good energy and floral lift on a long, smoky finish framed by velvety, well-knit tannins."
Wine Advocate
Score
92
Date
2022-07-18
"The 2015 Vi¤a Arana Gran Reserva, which was a Reserva until 2011, wants to showcase a new Gran Reserva style that combines freshness and joy with intensity, sophistication and aging potential through a blend of Tempranillo from Rodezno with 5% Graciano from Fuenmayor. The grapes were put through optical sorting and fermented in stainless steel for 19 days, and the wine matured in American oak barrels for three years with rackings every six months. This is the classical Haro style of Rioja Claret. They found that some special vintages of this wine behaved like a Gran Reserva, with a style that was closer to their 904. So, they wanted to make this consistent from vintage to vintage, a new a style of Gran Reserva, easier to understand than the 904 or 890. From 2012, the wine changes and they replaced the Mazuelo that was used in the past with Graciano, which they think is a grape very apt for Gran Reserva wines. I saw the wine with the 2015 vintage, a more developed nose with tertiary notes and some funkiness. They don't want this to be the small brother of 904. It's the entry level for Gran Reserva wines, for a younger generation; it's fresher and less complex but with good aging potential. In a year when they don't produce 904, the grapes would go to Vi¤a Arana. The palate reveals quite a lot of tannin and a dry finish. 80,000 bottles produced. It was bottled in December 2019."
Vinous
Score
91
Date
2020-09-01