Penedes, Catalunya
Penedès is the engine room of Spanish sparkling wine — if you've ever had a glass of Cava, there's a very good chance it came from here. It sits just southwest of Barcelona, and it has one of the longest winemaking histories in Europe: vines are said to have first been planted by Phoenician sailors as early as the 7th century BC, with the Romans later expanding the industry, helped by the region's easy access to Barcelona's port for trade.
For most of that long history, Penedès was red wine country. Before the 19th century, the region was planted mainly with red varieties like Garnacha, Monastrell, and Carinyena, until phylloxera devastated the vines in the mid-1800s. What followed reshaped the entire region: growers largely replanted with white grapes suited to sparkling wine production, right around the time a local winemaker was about to change everything. In 1870, José Raventós began making sparkling wine using the traditional Champagne method in the town of Sant Sadurní d'Anoia, eventually founding what became Codorníu, one of the two giant houses that still anchor the industry today. The term "cava" itself — Catalan for the underground cellars where the wine ages — was only formally applied to the sparkling wine in 1959, partly because France was protective of the word "Champagne" and didn't want it used by competitors.
The scale of what Penedès produces today is hard to overstate: around 95% of all Cava in the world comes from this one region, concentrated heavily around Sant Sadurní d'Anoia, home to many of Catalonia's biggest production houses. The traditional backbone is three indigenous grapes — Macabeo, Xarel·lo, and Parellada — each playing a different structural role: Macabeo for fruit and acidity, Parellada for freshness and perfume at higher elevations, and Xarel·lo for body and ageing potential.
What makes Penedès more interesting than just "Cava country," though, is how progressive and varied it's become. It's one of Spain's most experimental DOs, having long welcomed international grapes like Chardonnay and Merlot — the Torres family was among the first to bring modern winemaking equipment and French varieties to Catalunya in the mid-20th century. At the same time, there's been a real swing back toward heritage: producers have shown renewed interest in old Catalan red varieties like Sumoll, which were widely grown before phylloxera and had nearly disappeared.
It's also worth knowing that Penedès is the broader stage on which the Corpinnat story plays out — the rebel collective that broke away from the Cava designation in 2019 to apply stricter organic and territorial standards. Penedès is the whole, sprawling landscape; Corpinnat is a small, intensely focused slice of it. Together they show two sides of the same region: a centuries-old industrial sparkling wine powerhouse, and a newer movement insisting on doing it more carefully.
In this collection you'll find classic, traditional-method Cava alongside still wines made from Xarel·lo and other indigenous Catalan grapes — a region with both genuine scale and a quietly serious independent streak
