Last Friday, Albert Rooks and I were in Lisbon for our third Amorim Cork Conference. The two-day conference highlights innovations in cork use. Amorim is the world's largest cork producer and manufactures cork flooring, cork stoppers for wine and our own Thermacork.

This year, following a tour of the factory (more on the factory tour soon), we were surprised with a site visit much more fun then last year's school tour - Fitapreta Winery, located outside of Evora.

The winery is located on the grounds of a building that was built in 1308 - the winery wanted to build a production area that echoed the large block looks of the original building, but with a modern twist. They chose to use exterior facade cork to achieve this.

The large cork blocks carry through with the original large blocks in the building constructed over 700 years earlier. That said, the new building is definitely made for work. Below, employees are unloading a batch of grapes for making wine.

The inside of the building is where the wine making happens.

A window near the business office, highlights the building's connection to the countryside.

After the tour, there was plenty of time to hang out in the afternoon sun, taste the wine and appreciate the beautify of the Portuguese countryside. You can learn more about cork at our cork website, Thermacork.com. You can order cork at Small Planet Supply.