We at WRO are pleased to welcome Panos Kakaviatos to our ranks. A native of Washington D.C., Panos has been writing about wine professionally for 20 years. Now based in Strasbourg, France, he manages the wine blog wine-chronicles.com and has written for Decanter, The World of Fine Wine, Somm Journal and the news page of Wine-searcher.com, among other wine publications.
Panos is invited regularly to judge at professional tastings and enjoys organizing wine dinners in Europe and in the U.S. for like-minded wine lovers. Although his primary 
focus is French wine, he enjoys tasting in wine regions around the world. He is working toward his WSET Diploma, and has also been employed as a sommelier.
Based in Strasbourg, since 2011, where he works a “day job” for the Council of Europe as a spokesman and media relations specialist, Panos typically visits Burgundy or Bordeaux during the wine harvest, and regularly attends the April barrel tastings of Bordeaux as well as the Hospices de Beaune wine auction in November. He has also been designated an “Ambassador” for both Champagne and Châteauneuf du Pape.
Although Panos is (literally) most “at home” with European wines, he’s quite well-traveled and very broadly experienced. With a linguistic arsenal including French, German and Greek in addition to English, he has the tools and the “chops” to contribute strongly to our coverage of the wine world.
Please check out Panos’ first column–now up on the site in this week’s issue–regarding possible improvements to the labeling of Alsace wines. On behalf of all my WRO colleagues, welcome aboard, Panos!
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