EDDEA to design Bodegas Góngora’s new luxury wine tourism project in the Aljarafe
Bodegas Góngora’s project to create a museum of the history of wine in Seville, a small hotel and a space for events and celebrations will bear the signature of EDDEA and DN Arquitectura. Led by Luis Ybarra and Harald Schönegger respectively, the two studios will design this luxury wine tourism initiative in the Aljarafe, recovering the most authentic character of every room and showcasing the region’s winemaking heritage.
This old hacienda holds hundreds of American oak casks that keep the wines of Bodegas Góngora, the second oldest winery in Spain and the twelfth oldest in the world. Promoted by Howden Broking Group, the investment group that has acquired the premises, the initiative seeks to harness the region’s winemaking potential and foster quality tourism around wine culture.
To this end, it includes the construction of a boutique hotel and a high-end winery that will offer visitors exclusive experiences such as wine tastings, guided tours and viticulture-related activities. Landscaped gardens, leisure areas and restaurants are also planned to complement the wine offer.
The design comprises three elements. The historic winery and the wine press house will become a museum of Aljarafe wine, a tradition that goes back further than the trade with the Americas: its roots lie in Tartessos, and there is documentary evidence of a very significant trade with Rome in the years of the Empire. Even during the period of Islamic rule, cultivation partly continued in order to produce raisins.
Alongside this, in the house in the winery courtyard, “there will be a hotel with very few rooms, barely a dozen, but very large ones, arranged around the courtyards and reception rooms”, EDDEA explains.
Events and gastronomy
The winery’s bottling plant – with capacity to produce a million bottles a year – will move outside the historic complex to an adjoining warehouse area. All the space freed up inside will become an area for events and gastronomy. The winery also has 4,000 square metres of gardens, which will be refurbished while retaining all the existing vegetation.
Bodegas Góngora “has been run without interruption by the same family since 1682”, recalls Ignacio Gallego-Góngora, representing the eighth generation. The roots of this Aljarafe estate go deeper still, since “as early as 1574 there are documents that explicitly mention the Hacienda de San Rafael – the original name of this estate – and describe its features”, he adds.