Viña Perez Cruz is one of Chile’s top, premium quality wine producers. Their aim is to produce stunning quality wines with an identity that truly reflects their natural ‘terroir’.
The winery has won architectural awards for its design and the ability to harmonize with the natural surroundings. The architect José Cruz Ovalle crated a laminated wood building with low stone walls around the base. It measures 6000 square meters and has natural light. The wooden roof, supported on curved pillars of the same material, was designed to allow thermal isolation and free air flow circulation, both ideal for fine wine making.
The building is divided in three bays where the successive processes of fermentation, storage and bottling take place.
The production line for more complex wines has a gravitational process in every phase. The reception, selection and stemming of the grapes is done on the mezzanine, on the upper access level to the stainless steel tanks, where alcoholic fermentation takes place. There is a gravitational flow to an underground cellar where the wine undergoes malolactic fermentation in French and American oak barrels, under controlled temperature and humidity conditions. In addition there is a second barrel room at surface level, also with controlled temperature and humidity.
The fermentation and storage tanks, as much as the harvesting and wine pipes, are made from stainless steel. The capacity of these tanks s from 5,000 to 40,000 liters, giving more flexibility to achieve the best blends that harness and express the character from the Viña Pérez Cruz terroir.