Clos i Terrasses
A 20-something Daphne Glorian first discovered fine wine while working as the office manager for local Master of Wine Kit Stevens while studying law in Paris in 1998. What Daphne saw as a job to make ends meet would soon become a career she would dedicate her life to.
Not long after she took the job, Daphne was introduced by Kit to Priorat winemaking legends René Barbier and Álvaro Palacios, who described the region with such passion that she decided she needed to go and see it for herself.
You may have heard of Priorat’s brown schist soils the locals call Llicorella, the steep terrain, and the intense Mediterranean sun that hastily nurtures the low-yielding old Grenache and Carignan vines.
Experiencing Priorat in the flesh and seeing its potential first-hand, she took a big, life-changing leap of faith. Convinced by her friend Alvar and René, she spent her life savings on some old Grenache vines planted on 17 hillside plots just outside the village of Grallatops, pooling her resources with them to start making a new style of wine in the region.
In a region now filled with big names, Daphne Glorian has become a quiet mentor to the younger generations of Priorat winemakers, promoting the good name of the region with her exceptional and highly sought-after wines under her Clos i Terrasses label.
In her early vintages, Daphne relied on her friends René and Álvaro for advice, but guided by her instincts and her training in Burgundy, her wines have evolved to become some of the most sought-after references for the Priorat region – and along the way, some of the most desired wines in the world.
Despite having received multiple 100 point scores from top critics, Daphne has kept Clos i Terrasses boutique in size and has not significantly increased production of her most famous wine Clos Erasmus, preferring to create a second, equally expressive wine, Laurel.
