Domaine Economou

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Yiannis Economou, over the past decade or so, has gone from a little-known, recluse, hermit-like producer in Sitia (an isolated part of Crete which is already itself isolated from the rest of Greece) to be known as one of the best producers in Greece, and then, at some unfixed point transcending that and just simply being one of the best producers in the world.

His wines have reached the ever talked about “cult” status that so many producers aspire to, but few really gain. Part of the allure of Gianni’s wines is that they are like nothing else. The reds are somehow Piedmontese, somehow Burgundian, somehow Châteauneuf-du-Pape as seen through the sandy soils of Chateau Rayas, but always uniquely Cretan, with wild garrigue and steeped in incense, giving them a unique, Byzantine profile. His whites are made in the oxidative style of Chateau Simone in Provence. With high altitude tension and again garrigue, interplaying with the expert oxidation.

Adding to the mystique, Economou has the most incongruous release schedule of perhaps any producer, ever. It would be one thing to say that he releases his wines when he thinks they’re ready, or that he holds back vintages for 2 or 3 years beyond his neighbors and peers, and, of course, there are always wineries that hold back some stock of vintages for library releases, but with Domaine Economou you have a winery whose white wines have a minimum of 5 years of ageing, if not more, and often much more, and whose red wines may have up to 20 years of rest before release.

A quick Google search on Gianni will reveal that he worked a decade in Piedmonte at a time when Elio Altare was taking a chainsaw to his botti, and no one knew what a Barolo was let alone paid the prices that they now fetch. Another 3 years in Freiburg, working with Riesling in Baden, and then finally at Chateau Margaux working on the blends. What it won’t tell you is that Chateau Margaux, upon Gianni tendering his resignation, offered him in his words “crazy money” to stay on. An offer, one might say, that he couldn’t refuse. Except that he did, as the call to return to his native Crete and apply the trade that he had learned for 15 years abroad on his family's ancient, ungrafted vines on the high, Ziros plateau in the appellation of Sitia.

Domaine Economou is today rightly seen as part of the rarefied constellation of producers that make what world-class wine is supposed to be. All done, as in most cases, at his own time, at his own direction and vision, and with a willing and eager public wanting authentic representations from the disparate corners of our wine world.