Luís Patrão was born and raised in Bairrada. As a teenager he earned his pocket money working for the local cooperative in Vilarinho during the grape harvest. During the summer holidays he helped his father with the wine production. The grapes came from his grandmother's vineyard, which is very typical of the region: Here, every family has its own small winery. The grapes were mostly sold to the local cooperative, the wine - if you made wine like the Patrãos - to big wine merchants like the Caves São João or São Domingo.
When the cooperative had to close in 2010, Luís convinced his father to take wine seriously himself. Wine culture is strong and strong in the Bairrada, so Luís knew this would be his path. In the meantime he had also continued his education and studied oenology in Vila Real. He was soon hired as head winemaker at Esporão, where he also met his current wife, Eduarda Dias. She is Brazilian and her father is an important wine importer. Together, the couple decided to found the Vadio winery, which means "the vagabond".
Luís and Eduarda have invested a great deal in the wine cellar and the vineyards, which they carefully tend to without the use of machines as far as possible. Luís also works for Coelheiros in the Alentejo - here too as chief winemaker. Luís and Eduarda currently only own 4.5 hectares, which explains the small volumes of their respective wines. In the future, the two want to be 100% self-sufficient, with their own organically certified grapes.
Vadio focuses on developing local grape varieties such as Baga for the red wines and Cercial and Bical for the white wines. Luís has his own vision of the Baga grape, probably shaped by his time in the Alentejo. This is definitely an advantage for his red wines, which have a smoothness that many other Bairrada Baga wines don't have. He wants to prove that these wines are drunk young, even if they have fantastic aging potential. Luís Patrão describes his work like this: "Little work in the cellar and a lot of hard work in the vineyards." Although Luís is not a big fan of Bairrada sparkling wine, fortunately he makes some. We think they are excellent. The base wines are made using the Solera process made a lot of Bical as the main wine and without Maria Gomes.The oldest base wines in this version are: Bical (60%), Baga (30%) and Cercial (10%) They are from the vintages 2009 to 2015.
Manufacturer's address: Vinhos Vadio, 3780-594 Vilarinho do Bairro, Portugal.
