Casa Américo: from a dream to an heritage of Dão
Casa Américo is situated in Serra da Estrela, a part of Dão – one of the most ancient winemaking regions of Portugal. Despite its recent history, the estate has a special significance for the region. Its strong ties with winemaking traditions and willingness to produce singular, age worthy wines to keep in the cellar, or expressive and recognizable ones to reunite people, inspired Casa Américo to focus only on Portuguese grape varieties for its flagship wines and to start a project of revival of autochthonous varieties of Dão.
All started with a dream
Making wine in his homeland, Serra da Estrela, always was a dream of Américo Seabra, whose name bears the winery (“Casa Américo” means “House of Américo”). In 1967, Américo with his family emigrated to the USA, where he created a commercial empire in food distribution and made a fortune. But his heart always belonged to Portugal. In 2000 he and his wife returned to Portugal, and in 2009 his children decided to fulfill his dream and create Seacampo Sociedade Agricola, which is known as Casa Américo Wines. Now the estate continues to develop: starting from 5 ha, today it reunites seven domains, with a common surface of 150 ha of vineyards. It also has huge winemaking and bottling capacities in Gouveia, which were rebuilt from facilities of an old traditional cooperative winery, and invests in the development and enhancing the notoriety of Dão and Serra da Estrela regions.
Casa Américo vineyards and terroir of Serra da Estrela
Serra da Estrela is a sub-region of Dão (demarcated in 1908). It is situated on the west slope of the Serra da Estrela mountain of 2000 meters high, and benefits from an important mountain influence. The climate here is continental, with cold, sometimes snowy, winters and dry, hot summers. There is also important amplitude between day and night, allowing obtaining ripe and concentrated grapes, with lots of freshness.
Vineyards of Casa Américo are situated on a high altitude, between 400 and 600 meters (the highest vineyard with white and red varieties is on 625 meters of altitude), on typical granitic soils of Serra da Estrela, which gives wines elegance, concentration, a mineral touch, a remarkable freshness and makes them different from the wines of a wider Dão region. Not only reds, but also white wines of Casa Américo can age for 10, even 20 years, thanks to the characteristics of this unique terroir.
The most vines of the estate are 20-50 years old, despite a rather recent history of the domain. From 2009, Casa Américo was gradually expanding by the acquisition of old vineyards, abandoned by the population because of their aging and difficulties of work in this land. In order to prevent this heritage from disappearing, Casa Américo integrated these vineyards into its territory.
Attachment to Portuguese winemaking traditions
Casa Américo focuses mostly on Portuguese grape varieties – Touriga National, Encruzado, Alfroncheiro, as well as Jaén (Spanish Mencia), brought to Serra da Estrela region from Spain by the pilgrims of Santiago de Compostela. Monovarietal wines from Portuguese Encruzado and Touriga National are the flagships of the domain, complex and age worthy wines with a recognizable character, perfectly representing the profile of Portuguese wines.
Strongly attached to the traditions, Casa Américo invests in a unique project of preservation of rare autochthonous grape varieties of Dão: Alvadurão, Alvarelhão, Baga, Barcelo, Camarate, Gouveio, Terrantez, Tinta Pinheiro, Uva Cão, A rehabilitation vineyard at Quinta Nova is entirely dedicated to new plantations of these autochthonous Dão grapes, which will later produce wines, testimonials of winemaking traditions of the past.
Resíduo Zero certification for advanced sustainable viticulture
It is another important project of the estate. One of the vineyards of Casa Américo, Quinta do Paço, was the first vineyard on the Iberian Peninsula to obtain Zero Residue certification. It is not restricted to the application of particular products, and allows chemical, phytopharmaceutical, biological products and environmental-friendly techniques, as long as the final product has no pesticide residues. It also includes management of rainwater, flora and fauna of the vineyard. To start Casa Américo has chosen a small plot of 1 ha of Touriga National in Quinta do Paço because its vineyard also had the necessary infrastructure and biodiversity (hedges, wood, fauna, insect colonies, bees), which permitted it to apply the principles of Residue Zero approach. In the harvest of 2023, all 15 hectares of Quinta do Paço get the certification.
Moreover, Residue Zero is a more sustainable, efficient and not as restrictive technique, because it has no restrictions on used products, optimizes the use of natural resources, takes care of the environment, promotes biodiversity and produces less waste.
