Mateus (wine)

Mateus is a brand of medium-sweet frizzante rosé wine produced in Portugal.
History.
The Mateus brand was created in 1945, and production began at the end of World War II. The wine was especially styled to appeal to the rapidly developing North American and northern European markets. 
An early admirer was Sacheverell Sitwell:Among the delights of Portugal are the unfamiliar wines upon the wine lists... there is one wine that is altogether exceptional, and that comes from the remote northern Province of Tras-os-Montes. This is the most delicious "vin rosé" that I have ever tasted. It is called Mateus, and it may be that the view of the lovely villa of that name, near Vila Real, which is upon the label, makes the wine taste even better. For the villa has a façade of granite and white stucco, with many urns and statues. But what is unique in this wine is that it is the colour of orangeade, and slightly "pétillant". Let no one despise it for its colour! Mateus is delicious beyond words; and since I am told that it will travel and is exported to Brazil, it is a pity that one cannot buy it here in England.
Production grew rapidly in the 1950s and 1960s, and by the late 1980s, supplemented with a white version, it accounted for almost 40% of Portugal's total export of table wine. At that time, worldwide sales were 3.25 million cases per year.
Roger Scruton recorded the social impact which the wine had in England:
My two sisters and I were raised in the shelter of penury and puritanical restraint. And maybe we would have retained the meek decencies of our childhood, had it noe been for the great transformation that our generation underwent when the Portuguese brand called Mateus Rosé burst on the scene, along with other breaches of English decorum around 1963...
Producer.
Sogrape, the family company which owns the brand and which is the largest wine producer in Portugal, has more recently diversified into other areas of the Portuguese wine industry, as the popularity of its Mateus brand has declined. In the UK in 2002, the wine was re-packaged and relaunched in a deliberate effort to capitalise on 1970s nostalgia, although the wine itself had already been made less sweet and slightly more sparkling, in response to modern popular preference for slightly drier wine. The wine continues to be sold, however, in its distinctive narrow-necked, flask-shaped bottle, with unique "baroque historic mansion" label (Mateus Palace in Vila Real, Portugal) and real cork stopper, but also comes with a screw top from some distributors in Northern European countries and the U.K. market.
Varieties.
More recently, a new variety of the wine has been marketed as "Mateus Rosé Tempranillo" produced in Spain, a deeper shade of pink than the original, but in a clear bottle with a silver foil, aimed at wine drinkers in their twenties, especially young women.
In 2014 the company launched its "Expressions" range, comprising three rosé wines – Baga and Shiraz, Baga and Muscat, and Aragonez and Zinfandel – and one white wine – a Maria Gomes and Chardonnay blend.