Chateau khashmi

A Gateway to Kakheti’s Wine Routes, Forty Minutes from Tbilisi

Forty kilometres east of the capital, past the last suburbs and into the vine-covered hills of Sagarejo district, the village of Khashmi gave its name to one of Kakheti’s most respected Saperavi bottlings long before it gave its name to a hotel. Chateau Khashmi arrived to put a roof over that reputation: eleven suites built around a working cellar and a kitchen that treats the estate’s own wine as an ingredient, not just a pour at dinner. It is less a hotel attached to a vineyard than a vineyard that happens to offer beds.

Why It Works

We chose Chateau Khashmi because it solves a real problem for travellers short on time: proper Kakheti wine country, the kind with its own qvevri cellar and its own grape variety on the label, reachable as a day trip from Tbilisi rather than a full relocation to Telavi or Sighnaghi. The suites sit directly above the cellar, so the distance between a tasting and a night’s sleep is a flight of stairs, and the restaurant keeps the estate’s own harvest on every plate rather than treating the wine list as separate from the kitchen.

Why This Location

Sagarejo district is the quieter entry point to Kakheti, the first wine country a traveller reaches heading east from Tbilisi and often the one driven straight through toward better-known towns. Chateau Khashmi makes the case for stopping here instead: vineyards on both sides of the road, the Saperavi of Khashmi growing where it has for generations, and none of the crowds that gather around Sighnaghi’s hilltop viewpoints. It rewards travellers willing to treat the first stretch of wine country as a destination rather than a drive-through.

Fast Facts

• Prix: €€€ (Luxe)

• Vibe: working winery, suites above the cellar, convivial

• Chambres: 11 suites

• Best For: short wine-country breaks from Tbilisi, travellers who want to cook as well as taste

• Our Favorite Thing About the Hotel: the qvevri opening ceremony, done the traditional way before dinner

• Dining: Georgian and European cuisine built around the estate’s own wine and ingredients

• Amenities: family wine cellar, restaurant, cooking masterclasses, chacha distilling

• Attractions: the Kakheti wine routes, Sagarejo’s vineyards, Tbilisi (40 km)

The Cellar and the Saperavi of Khashmi

The hotel takes its name, and its signature wine, from the Saperavi grown in Khashmi village, a bottling Kakheti winemakers have long rated among the region’s most distinguished reds. The on-site cellar keeps production visible rather than ornamental: guests can watch a qvevri opened the traditional way, the buried clay vessel levered up and the wine drawn out in front of them, before it ever reaches the table. It is a more honest introduction to Georgian winemaking than a tasting room built purely for show, and it anchors the whole stay around a single, specific grape rather than a generic wine-country theme.

In the Kitchen: Qvevri, Khinkali and Chacha

Dinner runs on the same logic as the cellar: Georgian staples — khinkali dumplings, khachapuri, mtsvadi grilled over open coals — sit alongside European dishes built from what the estate grows and presses, and guests who want to do more than eat can join cooking classes that run through bread-baking, churchkhela-making and chacha distilling. It turns a wine stop into something closer to a full afternoon of Kakheti’s table culture, condensed into a single stay rather than spread across a week of separate excursions.

What to Know Before You Book

Chateau Khashmi works best as a short, focused stop: a night or two to cover the cellar, a cooking class and a proper dinner, rather than a week-long base. Its forty-kilometre distance from Tbilisi makes it realistic to combine with a city stay on either side, and travellers heading onward to Telavi or Sighnaghi can treat it as the first stop on the wine route rather than a detour from it. Suites are limited to eleven, so a cellar visit and a cooking class are worth requesting at the time of booking rather than on arrival.