Viña Lechagua

The winery

Viña Lechagua was born within Fundo Lechagua, a farm on the outskirts of Ancud that the Fogliatti family has owned since 1985. The idea came in the late 1990s, when Juan Ignacio Fogliatti, then an agronomy student at the Universidad Católica, did an agroclimatic study of the estate and found, on a north-facing slope a few steps from the sea, conditions similar to those of the central Chilean coast. In 2006 he planted 2,000 vines of twelve varieties, the archipelago's first varietal garden. After years of trial and error, the project was taken up again in 2016, and between 2020 and 2021 the current vineyard was planted. In April 2024 the SAG (Chile's agricultural and livestock service) visited the winery to assess the Chiloé Designation of Origin, which was declared in 2025 and which Lechagua championed.

The vineyard covers about one hectare at high density, with more than 6,000 head-trained plants and no wires, in the Itata manner, so that the wind airs them and the sun reaches them from every side. The climate is temperate and humid, under the constant influence of the Quetalmahue gulf, and the soils are sandy loam with slate rock. It grows Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay and Gewürztraminer. The first bottled harvest was 2023, with a Riesling and a Sauvignon Blanc; the 2025 Riesling, dry, at 8.5% alcohol and with very marked acidity, yielded just some 20 bottles. The winery shares the slope with evergreen forest and native wildlife: its flowers are a refuge for the endangered bumblebee Bombus dahlbomii, and Chilote pigs graze between the rows. With such a small production, its wines have no published shop or distribution.

Lechagua is not after mass tourism: with a booking, it receives winemakers, sommeliers, wine professionals and curious travelers, on private and small-group visits. According to the winery, the session can include a walk of about two hours along the slope, a vertical tasting of its whites, black-rimmed oysters from the Quetalmahue gulf, Chilote cooking and a hike through the estate's forest; from June to September it also offers a winter experience. It publishes no prices or hours, and visits are requested by email. The estate is about 5 km from the center of Ancud via route W-200.