After years of research, friends and former Dirk Niepoort disciples and enologists, Riccardo Alves and Frederico Machado, began their own courageous project in 2018. In the desolate high altitude (600-700m) hills overlooking the Douro River (Duero in Spanish) of Portugal’s Trás-os-Montes, the territory is rugged, rocky, and steep; a terrain of ancient acidic Pangean-era rocks (mostly granite, schist and gneiss), variations of sand and clay, and far more than fifty indigenous varieties from ancient vines grown in an extreme continental climate with hot summer days and cold nights. Each of their red and white wines blend dozens of varieties and express their terroir with clarity. All the vineyard work is organic and done by hand with target alcohols between 10.5-12.5%. The wines are spontaneously fermented, and the reds usually have 100% whole bunches and are aged in old French oak barrels, concrete and steel. None of the wines are fined or filtered.