1964-1996: Rioja Library Collection at SommSelect
Step back in time with a rare shipment of library vintage Rioja, sourced directly from Spain and spanning more than three decades from 1964 to 1996. Featuring extraordinary vintages such as 1964 and 1970 alongside benchmark years including 1986 and 1994, this collection offers a remarkable glimpse into the wines and winemaking traditions that established Rioja as one of Spain's great fine wine regions.
While collectors routinely chase mature Bordeaux and Burgundy, traditional aged Rioja remains one of fine wine's great secrets. The greatest bottles develop haunting aromatics, silky texture, savory complexity and remarkable longevity, often after decades of maturation. This release brings together historic bottlings from some of Rioja's most important houses, including La Rioja Alta, CVNE, Bodegas Riojanas, Faustino, Muga, Montecillo and Franco-Españolas.
These are wines from the era when Rioja was built around patience. Extended maturation in traditional oak followed by years of bottle aging created a distinctive style that cannot be reproduced simply by holding a young wine in a cellar. With age, the fruit becomes more nuanced, the oak integrates, and layers of dried fruit, tobacco, leather, spice, earth and savory complexity emerge.
Every bottle in this collection has been individually inspected for condition and provenance. Considering the extraordinary age of these wines, the bottles, labels and fill levels are remarkably well preserved, with select examples retaining their original historic packaging. These are mature wines that have already spent decades becoming what they were intended to become, making them ready to experience now.
Stocks are extremely limited. Explore the collection below and discover a rare piece of Rioja's living history.
Iconic Historic Rioja Producers
The strength of this collection lies not only in its age, but in the producers represented. La Rioja Alta anchors the lineup with its legendary Gran Reserva 904, one of the defining wines of traditional Rioja and a benchmark for long-lived Spanish wine. CVNE brings another pillar of Rioja Alta with its historic Imperial wines, while Bodegas Riojanas represents the traditional Cenicero style through bottlings such as Viña Albina and Monte Real.
Bodegas Muga adds Prado Enea, one of Rioja's most respected traditional Gran Reservas, while Faustino contributes bottles from a house whose mature Gran Reservas helped introduce classic Rioja to collectors around the world. Franco-Españolas connects the collection directly to Rioja's early history and the French influence that helped shape the region's modern wine industry.
The collection also reflects the remarkable diversity of Rioja's historic producers. Montecillo brings its old-school Gran Reserva style, while houses such as Campillo, Coto de Imaz, Berberana and Bodegas Bilbaínas provide a broader view of the wines that defined Rioja's golden age. Together, these bottles show that the story of classic Rioja was never limited to a handful of famous names. It was a deep and varied wine culture built around aging, consistency and time.
At the heart of the collection are the bottles themselves. The 1964 La Rioja Alta 904 and 1964 Monte Real represent the extraordinary longevity of Rioja's greatest early vintages. The 1968 and 1970 bottlings take us deeper into the classic era, while the 1980s and 1990s show how that traditional style evolved as Rioja entered the modern international wine market.
Every bottle in this collection has been individually inspected for condition and provenance. Considering the extraordinary age of these wines, the bottles, labels and fill levels are remarkably well preserved, with select examples retaining their original historic packaging. These are wines that have already spent decades becoming what they were intended to become, making them ready to experience now.
Rioja Producers
La Rioja Alta SA
Few names carry more weight in traditional Rioja than La Rioja Alta. Founded in Haro in 1890, the house built its reputation on beautifully balanced wines given extraordinary amounts of time to mature in oak and bottle before release.
The Gran Reserva 904 is the centerpiece of the house and one of Rioja's great collector wines. It is a benchmark for the classic style: red fruit transformed by decades of evolution into dried cherry, leather, tobacco, spice and savory complexity, with the acidity and structure to keep the wine alive. Our 1964 and 1968 bottles are the kind of mature Rioja that makes you understand why this category has such a devoted following.
CVNE
Founded in Haro in 1879, CVNE is one of the great foundational names of Rioja. But its importance goes beyond tradition. The house has consistently managed to bridge Rioja's historic style with its evolution toward estate-driven, site-specific wines.
Imperial is the collector's classic, a wine with an extraordinary track record for aging and one of the most recognizable names in mature Rioja. At the same time, CVNE's Viñedos del Contino helped establish the single-estate model in Rioja, making the producer an important link between the region's past and its modern identity. Our 1986 Imperial and 1996 Viña Imperial show the house at two fascinating points in its history.
López de Heredia
If there is one producer that embodies the soul of old-school Rioja, it is López de Heredia. Founded in Haro in 1877, the house has remained fiercely committed to traditional methods, including extended aging and a distinctive approach to winemaking that has changed remarkably little over generations.
Viña Tondonia is the icon. From its historic vineyard along the Ebro, it has become one of Spain's most recognizable and collectible wines, prized for its haunting aromatics, savory complexity and extraordinary longevity. The 1994 Tondonia that appeared in our library is a perfect example of why these bottles disappear quickly when they surface.
Bodegas Faustino
Faustino helped introduce the world to mature Rioja. Founded in 1861, the house became one of Spain's great export producers, and its Gran Reservas became almost synonymous with the classic image of aged Rioja around the world.
For collectors, that history is important. These are wines from an era when Rioja was routinely given years of oak and bottle age before reaching the market. The 1968 and 1970 Gran Reservas offer a chance to experience that tradition at genuine maturity, with the secondary and tertiary character that only time can create.
Bodegas Muga
Bodegas Muga represents the best of Rioja's traditional-modern balance. Founded in 1932 and still based in Haro's Barrio de la Estación, Muga has built a reputation around classic Rioja structure, meticulous cellar work and serious aging potential.
The great collector bottling is Prado Enea Gran Reserva, one of the region's most consistently compelling examples of mature Rioja. Rather than chasing power, Prado Enea is about refinement and evolution. The 1970 and 1994 vintages in our library demonstrate just how beautifully this style can develop over decades.
Bodegas Riojanas
Founded in 1890, Bodegas Riojanas belongs to the same formative generation as La Rioja Alta and remains one of Rioja's essential historic houses. Its great traditional labels, Monte Real and Viña Albina, are particularly interesting because they preserve the style of Rioja that dominated the region long before the current obsession with single vineyards and terroir.
The 1964 Monte Real is a standout bottle in this collection, while the 1970 Viña Albina Gran Reserva offers another fascinating expression of Rioja's classic era. These are exactly the kinds of wines that reward collectors who want to go beyond the obvious names.
Franco-Españolas
Franco-Españolas is Rioja history in a bottle. Founded in 1890 during the period of intense French influence in Rioja, the house emerged directly from the commercial and winemaking transformation that followed the crisis in French vineyards.
Its Royal wines are especially evocative today. The 1966 and 1970 bottlings capture the old Rioja model of long maturation, restrained fruit and savory development. They may not have the headline recognition of 904 or Tondonia, but for anyone interested in what Rioja actually tasted like during its golden era, they are fascinating bottles.
Bodegas Bilbaínas
Bodegas Bilbaínas is inseparable from Haro's legendary Barrio de la Estación. Established in 1901, the house grew during the period when the railway transformed Rioja into an important national and international wine region.
Its significance today is historical as much as stylistic. A bottle from Bilbaínas connects directly to the era when Rioja was being shipped north by rail, aged in traditional cellars and introduced to drinkers far beyond Spain. It is part of the larger story behind why mature Rioja became a category of its own.
Bodegas Paternina
Paternina is one of those old Rioja names that serious collectors should recognize, even if it does not receive the attention of today's headline producers. Its history stretches back to Rioja's formative years, when extended maturation and export were becoming central to the region's identity.
The old Viña Vial bottlings are particularly compelling. A mature Paternina offers something you simply cannot recreate with a modern release: a direct taste of the Rioja that generations of Spanish wine drinkers actually grew up drinking.
Bodegas Beronia
Beronia represents a slightly later chapter in the story, founded in 1973 but deeply rooted in Rioja's traditional culture of blending and extended maturation. Its older 5º Año is particularly interesting because the wine itself reflects the old Rioja obsession with time.
Before "terroir" became the dominant language of fine wine, Rioja often communicated quality through how long the wine had been aged. A bottle like this is a reminder of that philosophy, and a fascinating snapshot of the period when Rioja was becoming one of Spain's great international wine regions.
Aging in Rioja
To understand old Rioja, you have to understand that time is part of the wine's identity. Few major wine regions have built their reputation so deliberately around extended maturation. Traditionally, Rioja was not simply bottled young and left to the collector to age. Producers often matured their wines for years in the winery before release, allowing oak aging and subsequent bottle maturation to become part of the winemaking process itself.
The classic Rioja system is built around four principal aging categories: Joven, Crianza, Reserva and Gran Reserva. Joven wines are released relatively young with little or no required aging. Crianza represents the first level of meaningful maturation, while Reserva and Gran Reserva require substantially longer aging before release. The exact regulatory requirements have evolved over time, and historic bottles do not always conform neatly to today's rules, but the underlying philosophy remains the same: Rioja traditionally asks the producer to do much of the aging before the wine reaches the market.
Crianza
Crianza is the entry point into Rioja's traditional aging hierarchy. These wines receive meaningful maturation in oak and bottle before release, but are intended to retain more primary fruit and freshness than Reserva or Gran Reserva.
Reserva
Reserva represents a more developed style, with additional time in oak followed by bottle aging. The extra maturation begins to transform the wine. Fresh fruit becomes more integrated with notes of tobacco, leather, dried herbs, spice and cedar, while the tannins become softer and more polished.
Gran Reserva
Gran Reserva is the pinnacle of Rioja's traditional aging system. These wines are made from particularly suitable vintages and traditionally receive extensive maturation before release. With decades of additional bottle age, the best examples can become extraordinarily complex, developing layers of dried fruit, leather, forest floor, tobacco, spice, cedar and savory tertiary character.
This is why a mature Rioja can be such a different experience from a young red wine. The goal is not simply concentration. It is evolution. Fruit becomes more subtle, tannins become silky, acidity carries the wine through its development, and secondary and tertiary aromas gradually take center stage.
For collectors, this distinction is crucial. A 1964 Gran Reserva is not simply a 60-year-old version of a young Rioja. It is a wine that was designed from the beginning around extended maturation. The producer's cellar aging was part of its identity, and decades of bottle development can take that process much further.
That is also why traditional Rioja can be one of the great values in mature wine. Bordeaux and Burgundy collectors often pay enormous premiums for wines of comparable age, while historic Rioja can still offer access to fully mature bottles from legendary producers and important vintages at considerably more approachable prices.
Food and Wine Pairing
One of the great strengths of traditional Rioja is its versatility at the table. The wines combine bright acidity, moderate alcohol, savory development and softened tannins, making them remarkably food-friendly even after decades in bottle. As Rioja ages, the fruit becomes less dominant and the wine develops flavors of dried cherry, tobacco, leather, mushroom, earth and spice. Those secondary and tertiary notes make mature Rioja particularly effective with savory dishes.
For the older bottles in this collection, the key is not to overpower the wine. These are mature wines with delicate aromatics and fully integrated tannins. Rich sauces, aggressive spice or heavily charred meats can overwhelm the subtleties that decades of bottle aging have created.
Roasted & Braised Meats
Roast lamb is one of Rioja's classic pairings. The combination of tender meat, herbs, garlic and the savory character of mature Tempranillo is almost ideal. Slow-roasted lamb shoulder, braised lamb shank and traditional Spanish lamb preparations work beautifully with older Gran Reservas.
Beef is equally compelling, particularly braised short ribs, beef cheeks, roast beef and steak with mushroom or wine-based sauces. With very old Rioja, favor preparations that emphasize tenderness and savory depth rather than extreme char or heavy seasoning.
Spanish Cuisine
For a collection like this, Spanish food is an obvious place to start. Jamón Ibérico, chorizo, morcilla, grilled sausages, roasted peppers and Manchego all work naturally with Rioja.
The combination of cured meat and mature Rioja is particularly effective. The salt, fat and umami of Jamón Ibérico bring out the wine's acidity, while the dried fruit and savory complexity of an aged Gran Reserva provide enough depth to match the meat.
Mushrooms, Game & Earthy Flavors
As Rioja develops, its flavors increasingly move toward the earthy and savory. That makes wild mushrooms, truffles, roasted root vegetables and game particularly good pairings.
Try a mature Rioja with mushroom risotto, wild mushroom pasta, roasted mushrooms or venison with a restrained sauce. The earthy flavors in the food can mirror the tertiary character that develops naturally in an old Gran Reserva.
Poultry
Mature Rioja does not require red meat. Roast chicken, duck, turkey and game birds can be excellent, particularly when prepared with mushrooms, herbs, roasted vegetables or a light jus.
Duck is especially interesting with older Rioja because its richness provides a counterpoint to the wine's acidity, while the wine's dried-fruit character complements the meat.
Cheese
Traditional Rioja is exceptionally good with aged Manchego, which is perhaps the most obvious Spanish cheese pairing. Other firm, nutty and moderately aged cheeses can work as well.
With very old bottles, however, avoid extremely aggressive blue cheeses. Their intensity can overwhelm the delicate tertiary aromas of a mature wine.
The Older the Rioja, the More Delicate the Food
This is an important consideration with the bottles in this collection.
A 1964 or 1970 Gran Reserva should generally be treated differently from a younger Reserva. The wine may still have remarkable acidity and structure, but its aromatics can be delicate after five decades or more in bottle. Simple preparations are often best: roast lamb, roast poultry, mushrooms, Jamón Ibérico, Manchego or carefully prepared beef.
The younger bottles from the 1980s and 1990s can generally handle more substantial dishes. The 1986 CVNE Imperial Gran Reserva, for example, can stand up to richer braises and roasted meats, while a mature 1994 Muga Prado Enea can work beautifully with lamb, duck or mushroom-based dishes.
Ultimately, the best pairing for these wines is one that allows both the food and the wine to speak. Traditional Rioja was built around balance rather than sheer power, and after decades in bottle, that balance becomes even more apparent. The right dish should complement the wine's acidity, savory character and evolved aromatics rather than compete with them.
For truly historic Rioja, keep the food simple, savory and elegant. Let the bottle be the most interesting thing on the table.
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