People & Places

Georgia, told by the people who live it.

Winemakers, polyphonic singers, shepherds, mountain guides, home cooks — the remarkable people you’ll meet along the way, and the regions they call home.

“Stories are told by those who carry them.”

Featured · Co-founder

Ia Tabagari

Before there was a company, there was Ia — an ethnologist who mapped Georgia’s wine roads before the brown signs existed, and who has turned down the job of Tourism Minister more than once. She built Living Roots to send travellers to the families and makers who are the country’s real wealth — and quietly rebuilt a village’s horse-riding culture while she was at it.

Her story →Why it matters →

A few more of them

The people who make it Georgia

John Wurdeman

Winemaker · Painter

The artist who brought qvevri wine to the world’s tables.

[Portrait to select] — a Svan polyphonic singer

The keepers of song

Svaneti · Polyphony

Voices that have held these valleys together for a thousand years.

[Portrait to select] — a qvevri winemaker

The qvevri winemakers

Kakheti · Wine

Families pouring 8,000 years of amber wine straight from the cellar.

Ushguli towers under the snow-peaks of Svaneti, Georgia

Featured place

Svaneti — the high north

A valley of medieval stone towers under permanent snow-peaks, where families still sing in the harmonies that raised the walls. The road in is long; the reward is a place outside of time — glaciers above, watchtowers below, and a welcome that hasn’t changed in centuries.

Svaneti →The songs →

The places