In the early 2000s, Pueblo Garzón had fewer than two hundred inhabitants, dirt streets and a handful of houses falling apart. It was one of those ghost towns of the Uruguayan interior that the railway had brought into being and that the end of the train had condemned to oblivion. Today, by contrast, travelers from New York, London and Buenos Aires book months in advance to have lunch by its square and taste Tannat with a view of the vineyards. The story of how this dying village became one of the most coveted gastronomic destinations in South America is one of the most astonishing in Uruguayan tourism, and it begins long before the wine and the embers arrived.
Pueblo Garzón was born as a small rural town in the interior of the department of Maldonado, very close to the border with Rocha, in the heart of eastern Uruguay. Like so many other towns in the country, its origin and its first growth were tied to the advance of the railway and to the farming activity of the region: the countryside, cattle-raising and agricultural production were, for a long time, the livelihood of its people.
The arrival of the railway lines, which connected the interior with the capital and the ports, gave impetus to the formation of the village, with its station, its square, its church and its general store as the center of community life. It was a typical country town, of dirt streets, low adobe and stone houses, and a slow pace of life set by the rural tasks and the passing of the train.
During much of the 20th century, Garzón was one of those towns of the deep interior that, far from the major circuits, lived with their back to tourism and the bustle of the nearby coast. Its identity was fully rural, and nothing foreshadowed the spectacular reinvention it would experience decades later.
As happened to many towns of the Uruguayan interior, Garzón's fate was tied to that of the railway. Over the course of the 20th century, the progressive decline of rail transport of passengers and freight —displaced by the truck and the car— hit hard the towns that had grown around the stations. Garzón was no exception: with the train in retreat, the town gradually lost movement, economic activity and population.
For decades, the village seemed to remain suspended in time. The low houses, the square, the church and the old store were still standing, but the pace of life was fading and many young people emigrated in search of opportunities on the coast or in Montevideo. Garzón became one of those almost forgotten towns, of few inhabitants, where time seemed to have stopped and silence reigned in the dirt streets.
Paradoxically, that air of a village frozen in time —which at the time was a symptom of decline— would end up being, years later, one of its greatest charms and the appeal that would win over those who rediscovered it. The stillness, the old buildings and the intact rural landscape unknowingly preserved the perfect setting for a reinvention.
The great turn in Garzón's history came at the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st, when the town was rediscovered by a new wave of visitors and investors attracted precisely by its authenticity and its stillness. The key figure of that transformation was the famous Argentine chef Francis Mallmann, master of fire and ember cooking, who chose this lost town of the Maldonado interior to install a restaurant and a small boutique hotel around the square.
Mallmann's bet —sophisticated country cuisine in a rustic and elegant setting— drew foodies, travelers and figures from the world of art and fashion from all over the planet, and put Garzón on the international gastronomic map. Suddenly, that almost forgotten town began to appear in travel and food magazines as one of Uruguay's best-kept secrets, a cult destination for those seeking fine dining and rural authenticity far from the glamour of Punta del Este.
Mallmann's arrival worked as a catalyst: behind him came other high-end gastronomic, hotel and service offerings, which respected the village aesthetic and revalued the old buildings. Garzón thus began to be reborn, keeping its tiny scale and its country-town character, but with a new cultural and economic life revolving around cuisine and excellent hospitality.
To the gastronomic rebirth was added, decisively, the development of winemaking and olive growing in the Garzón region. The rolling gravelly soils and the climate moderated by the closeness of the ocean proved especially favorable for growing the vine and the olive tree, and that attracted investment that bet on turning the area into a high-end agricultural hub.
Among the pioneering and most recognized ventures are Bodega Garzón —a large-scale complex dedicated to wine and olive oil, with a sophisticated wine-tourism offer— and Colinas de Garzón, a pioneer in the production of internationally award-winning extra virgin olive oil. These projects demonstrated the potential of the region and positioned it among the most prestigious wine and olive areas in Uruguay and South America.
In the vineyards of Garzón, Tannat —Uruguay's emblematic grape— and Albariño, a white that found a remarkable expression in these soils, stand out, along with other varieties. The olive tree, for its part, gave oils that won awards at international competitions. The visits to wineries and mills, with tastings, were added to the town's gastronomic offer, completing a true circuit of wine and olive tourism that today is one of the great attractions of eastern Uruguay.
Garzón's transformation is part of a broader process of revaluation of eastern Uruguay, which in recent decades combined the development of the coast (with José Ignacio and the Punta del Este area at the forefront) with the rediscovery of the countryside and nature of the interior. One of the works that symbolized that new dynamism was the Garzón Lagoon Bridge, inaugurated in 2015.
The bridge crosses the Garzón Lagoon, which separates the departments of Maldonado and Rocha, and stands out for a completely original design: instead of a straight crossing, it describes a circular ring over the water. The ring shape forces drivers to slow down and, at the same time, gives a 360-degree panoramic view over the lagoon. The concept, associated with the renowned Uruguayan architect Rafael Viñoly, turned the work into an architectural icon and a tourist attraction in its own right.
Today, Pueblo Garzón is an emblematic case of reinvention: a village that went from near oblivion to being a destination of international prestige, without entirely losing its soul of a country town. The coexistence between lifelong neighbors and high-end gastronomic and wine-tourism offerings, in a landscape of vineyards, olive groves and gentle hills, defines the current identity of this small town of eastern Uruguay.