Fernando Remírez de Ganuza, founder of Remírez de Ganuza
After a long battle with lung cancer, Fernando Remírez de Ganuza, founder of the eponymous Rioja estate, passed away in Barcelona, where he was undergoing treatment, at the age of 73. His death was announced on Tuesday prompting immediate and heartfelt reactions from all those who worked and interacted with him throughout his illustrious, if unconventional, career.
‘Fernando leaves an incredible legacy, both professionally and personally, inextricably linked to the history of Rioja and Spanish wine,’ said Jose Ramón Urtasun, general manager of Remírez de Ganuza. ‘He led all our harvests, including 2023. The vineyards were his passion and the focus of all his energy.’
A path of his own
Remírez de Ganuza helped to define the present and future of modern Rioja, with an idiosyncratic approach that questioned many of the assumptions that constrained the region’s wine output in the late 1980s and 90s – prompting debates that, in light of recent developments within the DOCa, are still topical today. ‘In the 1990s, Rioja was an extremely traditional region, where wine production was led by local families. Fernando’s arrival represented the beginning of a revolution,’ said Urtasun.
Born in Navarra 1951, to a family dedicated to the production and retail of cured meats and sausages, Remírez de Ganuza went on to study technical drawing – a skill that would prove particularly useful in his later chapter as ‘bodeguero’. His inquisitive nature made him quit school at the age of 21, marking
