The Guardian: 'Why Georgia is a hotspot for natural wines'

Qvevri, a large, ancient Georgian winemaking vessel and Georgian winemaking traditions are the topics of a new report on The Guardian.

The Guradian accents on the qvevri’s ubiquity, which is more than quaint tourist-board marketing and says that it is a symbol of how proud the Georgians are of being the oldest winemaking country in the world.

"It’s a means of production that leads to highly distinctive wines. After being lightly pressed, whole bunches of grapes are thrown into the beeswax-lined pots, which are buried in the ground, and once fermentation has taken place, sealed and left to age. The result: amber-coloured whites with the grippy structure of reds, and reds that often display a wild, spicy, herby quality,” read the article.

"Though it represents a small, albeit highly visible and growing, fraction of the country’s output, the qvevri renaissance has put Georgia at the forefront of winemaking fashion. Their wines have become a must-have for the world’s best restaurants and wine shops, and they’ve inspired a global movement of likeminded producers to work with clay. For a country that spent much of the 20th century making vast quantities of rough industrial plonk at the behest of Soviet central planners, it’s quite a turnaround – as well as being quite a journey for the evergreen clay pot,” read the article.

Read the full story here.