The leading event for quality Spanish wine held from 2-4 February in the heart of Barcelona, brought together more than 1,300 exhibitors, 90 DOs and nearly 1,000 national and international buyers, offering a platform for valuable conversations and business opportunities.
This year, Barcelona Wine Week paid tribute to the finest family wine dynasties. As part of the programme, Decanter World Wine Awards (DWWA) hosted a masterclass showcasing families that defined excellence at the 2025 competition. Led by DWWA Co-Chair and Spanish expert Beth Willard and moderated by Decanter‘s Regional Chair for Spain, South America & Portugal, Ines Salpico, the masterclass featured eight wines scoring 95+ points.
From traditional-method sparkling to aromatic whites, robust reds and fortified wines, Willard presented a curated flight of DWWA 2025 Gold, Platinum and Best in Show award winners from across Spain.
The masterclass held on Tuesday 3rd February, was conducted in Spanish. The room was full of buyers, trade professionals, winemakers and wine enthusiasts.
Discover the eight wines showcased at the masterclass below
Willard began by explaining the rigorous judging process to attendees before diving into the wines. In 2025 nearly 17,000 wines from 57 countries were evaluated by 248 judges. Wines are grouped into carefully curated flights and judged against their peers.
Following the first tasting, Gold winners (95-96 points) are grouped by category and re-tasted blind in a second round of judging. The very best are elevated to Platinum (97+ points) and re-tasted a final time by the Co-Chairs, who then select the 50 Best in Show wines.
The masterclass was moderated by Ines Salpico, Decanter’s Regional Chair for Spain, South America & Portugal (right) and hosted by DWWA Co-Chair and Spanish expert, Beth Willard (left).
Spain once again had a strong year in 2025, ranking among the top three countries by number of medals. At the masterclass, Willard presented two of the competition’s 50 Best in Show – Vall Llach, Mas de la Rosa Gran Vinya Classificada 2023 from Priorat, and Del Duque V.O.R.S, Amontillado from González Byass.
The line-up also included a Value Gold wine (under £15 at the time of judging), underlying how quality is recognised at every price point.
Guests were highly engaged, taking notes, snapping photos and asking questions during the closing Q&A and after the session.
DWWA is committed to celebrating excellence in winemaking while reflecting real-world market conditions. In addition to the added exposure gained by producers who were featured in the masterclass, all exhibitors were able to hand deliver their wine entries for DWWA 2026 at the Decanter stand, providing a convenient and cost-effective shipping method.
See below to discover the line-up of 95-97-point wines which were presented on the day (in tasting order).
The eight masterclass wines
Alta Alella, Mirgin Exeo Evolució+ Brut Nature, Cava 2007
Gold, 95 points
60% Pansà Blanca, 40% Chardonnay
Gorgeous roasted hazelnuts, almonds, baked bread and biscuits set the tone with a permeating lemon and lime freshness besetting the mousse and a crunchy mineral finish. Alcohol 12%
Cherubino Valsangiacomo, deSantJaume Malvasia, Valencia 2024
Value Gold, 95 points
85% Malvasia, 15% Merseguera
Tantalising pear, apple, apricot and peach aromas underscored by tingling notes of grapefruit, lemon and lime. Bright and crisp with a linear structure and lengthy herbal finish. Alc 12.5%
Bodegas Alvear, Tres Miradas Paraje De Riofrío Alto 3er Año, Montilla-Moriles 2021
Platinum, 97 points
100% Pedro Ximenez
A formidable style, enchanting the nose with fennel, dried almond and herb characters and imbedding the palate with a mineral structure and an intriguing textural grip. Quenching, salivating and saline with swathes of toasted nuts on the finish. Alc 13.5%
Bodegas Valdemar, Conde Finca Alto Cantabria Viñedo Singular, Rioja 2023
Gold, 95 points
100% Viura
White peach, apricot and grapefruit aromas tumble over the glossy sheen of oak that cushions the embracing acidity. Creamy and plush with a piquant finish. Alc 13%
Bodegas Rodríguez Y Sanzo, Palo Norte Verdejo, Rueda 2020
Gold, 95 points
100% Verdejo
Intricately laced with dried chamomile, dried herbs and mace on the nose, with a flourish of delectable lemon peel acidity and a long nutty finish. Alc 13.5%
Bodegas Y Viñedos Verum, Ilusioverum Cdvin Garnacha, Rioja 2022
Gold, 95 points
100% Garnacha
Bedecked with redcurrants, red cherries and raspberries with a sizzling lick of black pepper. Softly structured with supple, plummy acidity and a boundless, spicy length. Alc 14.5%
Vall Llach, Mas de la Rosa Gran Vinya Classificada, Priorat 2023
Best in Show, 97 points
100% Carignan
Priorat has been almost as successful in our Best in Show pantheon as Barolo – this concrete-aged Carinyena is the region’s sixth laureate. This purity and finesse of this wine makes a convincing case for Carinyena as the pre-eminent variety for Priorat – and, contrariwise, for Priorat as the world’s greatest location for Carignan. It’s also a plaudit for concrete ageing, whether in egg or otherwise. The wine is a dark black-red in colour, and the aromas are less fruity than most; it’s one of those wines which seems to smell as much of a landscape as of fruit. It’s only two years old, yet the ageing has been so successfully managed that it has the seamlessness and harmony of a much older wine. On the palate, it is refined, graceful and shawl-like, full of lingering dark-fruit intensity but counterbalanced by the wine’s unstrenuous cashmere tannin and insinuating, palate-lapping acidity: extraordinary finesse for a variety often regarded as workmanlike elsewhere. Alc 15.5%
González Byass, Del Duque V.O.R.S, Amontillado, Sherry NV
Best in Show, 97 points
100% Palomino
Like the other Amontillado in this year’s Best in Show, this VORS (Very Old Rare Sherry) Amontillado is formidable. It’s slightly deeper in colour: a deep orange amber. Its aromas, too, are fuller and weightier than its peer, reminding the fortunate drinker of antique furniture and generously endowed college libraries – as well as the scents of dry places in high summer, with their warm stones, path-trodden, sun-dried figs and tough, scruffy herbs. On the palate, it is a little less savagely pure, aerial and vaporising, with more depth and bottom to it; it has dark corners and recesses of flavour, whereas its sibling was all light and air. Technically, in fact, it has a few grams of residual sugar, though you won’t notice those as the wine’s sheer power of flavour and acid cut more than offset any sweetness. A remarkable drink; a wine-world reference. Alc 21.5%
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