In Armenia, Outdated Vines Chart a New Future for Wine

Vines in Armenia are outdated. The truth is, a few of them are very outdated, relationship again 150 years, and but are nonetheless greater than in a position to produce grapes for wine. 

For the final ten years, Kristina Margaryan, head of the analysis of plant genomics on the Molecular Biology Institute of Armenia, has been cataloging misplaced and endangered indigenous varieties in each village and winery in Armenia’s Vayots Dzor area. 

“Interviews with the farmers, and written information saved within the native municipalities and church buildings, reveal that there are 100-year-old and even older vineyards there,” says Margaryan. Up to now, she has documented about 3,000 genotypes, 300 of that are thought of distinct varieties. To establish the grapes, her group works carefully with the Julius Kuhn Institute in Germany, which hosts one of many largest databases of grape genetic assets on the earth. 

When Armenia turned a part of the Soviet Union in 1922, winemaking shifted into collective farming, with grapes grown solely for brandy and dessert wine manufacturing. However some older vineyards, typically at excessive elevation, had been left uncultivated — and due to this fact spared for brand new generations who would revive the trade a long time later within the unbiased Republic of Armenia. 

The outdated vine mission

Winemakers Artem Parseghyan and Gomidas Merjanian joined Trinity Canyon Vineyards in 2016 and instantly began experimenting with completely different historical varieties. In 2020, they discovered an uncultivated 2.2-acre backyard stuffed with fruit bushes, bushes and Areni vines. The proprietor, in his seventies, advised the winemakers that his grandfather had planted the winery; it was a minimum of 120 years outdated, and one of many highest within the area at virtually 5,000 toes above sea stage. 

“One of many benefits of viticulture in Armenia is successfully vertical grape rising,” says Parseghyan. “This permits vineyards in the identical small location however at very completely different altitudes.” And people variations in terroir in such small areas enable for a particular complexity within the wines.

The 2 winemakers got here up with completely different labels for their very own wines (that are made at Trinity Canyon), each emphasizing the idea of a single winery. The identify of Merjanian’s wine, Dzon, is a tribute to the start of winemaking traditions. Parseghyan’s, Hazarvaz, actually interprets into “one thousand vines” — the quantity he has in his winery. “We at all times say that we’ve winemaking in our DNA. Artem and I wished to return and revive that historical past and heritage via these outdated vines,” says Merjanian. 

Restoring the previous 

Tatevik Gabrielyan and Jean Paul Berger based Krya Wines in Tatevik’s native village, Vernashen, after finding out winemaking collectively in Switzerland. In 2017, with Tatevik’s father’s assist, the couple began to amass vineyards. This wasn’t straightforward — after the privatization of land in 1991, a small plot, and even separate rows of vines, may need a number of house owners. The couple was lastly in a position to buy a small winery with two plots of fifty-five and seventy-five yr outdated vines. “The vines had been in actually dangerous form. Everybody suggested us to take them out and replant them. However we wished to protect the outdated varieties and to see what they had been able to,” recollects Gabrielyan. 

Reconstructing the winery took 4 years however resulted in a primary harvest of the crimson Areni Noir, plus 5 indigenous white grape varieties: Voskehat, Mskhali, Chilar, White Areni and Khatun Kharji. Their Areni Noir has notes of untamed berries, ripe cherries and hints of vanilla; the indigenous white mix is a pale, straw-yellow wine with aromas of citrus and contemporary pear. Then, in 2022, the couple additionally began their “Poqr Krya” mission (small Krya, mainly) to assist neighboring small vineyards with their harvests and produce a extra inexpensive line of wines, additionally representing the area’s heritage. 

Returning winemaking to town

Within the nineteenth century, Armenia’s capital metropolis of Yerevan had virtually 200 cellars that catered to vacationers. Norqi Keghar Vineyard, one of many 4 that stay, was based in 1877 by Hovhannes Derdzakyan, an orphan survivor of the Armenian Genocide. He had been adopted by a neighborhood couple who owned land in Norq, one of many oldest neighborhoods within the metropolis, and finally planted 5 acres of the indigenous selection Voskehat there, and constructed a home and cellar as properly. Within the 1920’s, he was pressured at hand over the winery to the Soviets; he stored solely the 150-year-old Khachabash vines that had been rising in his yard. However in 2019 his grandchildren along with two shut pals determined they need to make wine as soon as once more, utilizing the remaining outdated vines and harvesting old-vine fruit as properly from the Vayots Dzor, Aragatsotn and Armavir areas. 

“We determined to present a breath of contemporary air to this story,” says Artsrun Petrosyan, one of many cofounders of Norqi Keghar. “It was a lifestyle for our ancestors, but it surely was by no means allowed to achieve the extent of what they’ve, let’s say, in France. However with this mission we try to alter that.”

Norqi Keghar Vineyard makes 80 to 100 bottles of that historical Khachabash, ageing it within the 150 years outdated clay amphoras within the ideally preserved cellar. Lately, in addition they acquired a neighboring vineyard, which was in-built 1881. 

Admittedly, the marketplace for the wines constructed from these historical vines is principally home — the quantities are very small, and worldwide consciousness of the completely different varieties that develop right here is minimal. Artem Parseghyan and Gomidas Merjanian do export a small amount to France and Russia, and plan to have a illustration in Brazil as properly. Krya Wines are in Russia and Estonia, thus far. However maybe that’s a purpose for wine-lovers so as to add Armenia to their listing of someday-I-will-get-there locations.