Spain

Gabriela di Nardo

Gabriela is a Venezuelan Wine Educator and Community Manager, living and working in Barcelona, Spain. While not exposed to wine at a young age, Gabriela grew up immersed in the “exotic spices and fruits” of Venezuelan cuisine which “laid the groundwork from which [she] could develop [her] tasting skills”. Studying tourism and spending her teenage years in a mixture of fear, insecurity and uncertainty due to the political situation in her home country, Gabriela moved to Houston, Texas, to pursue first studies and then a career in restaurant and catering management. Returning back to Caracas at the expiry of her work visa in the USA, Gabriela recalled her time in charge of ordering wines while working as a restaurant manager in Houston, sparking her interest in wine and leading her to move to Barcelona in 2014 to join the University’s Sommelier Programme. Arriving with the idea that “Chardonnay was a synonym for White Wine and that Montsant was a wine made with genetically modified grapes”, Gabriela had little idea that this move would be the beginning of a long and fulfilling journey in the wine industry. Since then, she has gone on to work for Freixenet, Weingut Keller and Vila Viniteca, before becoming a freelance wine educator and consultant to this day. Her varied and wide experience since entering the wine trade has exposed her to “the challenges of being a Latin American woman working in wine”, with many people constantly questioning “what could a Venezuelan woman ever know about wine?” - Gabriela is determined to disprove these naysayers and serve as an example to other Latin American women by becoming the first ever Venezuelan Master of Wine.