Egiategia
Egiategia is a countercultural adventure that began on the French Basque Coast. In 2008, Emmanuel Poirmeur, an agricultural engineer and oenologist, decided to establish a winery in a region where there was no existing winemaking tradition: between the ocean and the mountains. A blank slate—embraced as such—to invent a new way of thinking about wine. The…

Egiategia
Egiategia is an unconventional adventure born on the French Basque Coast. In 2008, Emmanuel Poirmeur, an agricultural engineer and oenologist, chose to establish a winery where no winemaking tradition existed: between the ocean and the mountains. A blank slate, embraced as such, to invent a new way of thinking about wine.
Egiategia's uniqueness stems from an intuition that became reality: the aging and secondary fermentation of wines underwater. As early as 2007, Emmanuel filed a patent for underwater immersion. Some cuvées are thus aged 15 meters deep in the Bay of Saint-Jean-de-Luz, where pressure, darkness, and thermal stability provide an unprecedented environment for the wine. An experimental yet well-considered approach, never a gimmick.
The first Chardonnay vines were planted in 2009, followed by the renovation of an 18th-century building into a winery in Socoa in 2011. Without dogma, Emmanuel conceives viticulture and winemaking as a long creative process, where every action matters. Wine is not an end in itself, but the visible culmination of a broader journey.
Egiategia thus offers wines that aim less to convince than to challenge. Wines designed to suspend time, evoke emotions and memories, and invite contemplation. A complete experience, to be discovered on-site by appointment, serving as another reason to return to the Basque Coast.