The Regulatory Council of the Alicante Protected Designation of Origin has held a meeting of its promotion commission in the Ansaldo Tower of San Joan d’Alacant, a space recently recovered as an interpretation center of the Alicante Garden.
It is one of the building towers of the orchard that served as a private estate, winery, mill and defensive tower of the field, within the set of buildings that marked out the region from the sea inland. The origin of the set is from the 15th century and the beginning of the 16th. Between the 16th and 17th centuries, a cellar was attached to the tower in the semi-basement and later another cellar was created in the 19th century that kept visible elements such as the cup or the trascoladora.
The lineage of the Ansaldo, who came from Genoa, settled there during the 17th century to market and export Alicante wines which, generation after generation, never abandoned their activity or home.
The tower and house have been restored by the San Joan City Council and converted into a museum space that hopes to open to the public in March. On the plot itself, it is even planned to recover vineyards, almond trees and other elements that complete the vision of what this entire area was like in previous centuries. The house also preserves its small chapel, irrigation elements, traditional kitchen, cistern, etc.
The Alicante denomination of origin owes its name to the hundred-year-old crops grown in the capital’s orchards and the development of wineries and industry that began in towers and houses like this one, which has meant “a recovery of its origins” for the council. Among its objectives is to promote this knowledge and help its conservation and dissemination.
