Vintage 2023 and Saint Vincent 2024

For us winegrowers, the 2023 wine season ends by celebrating our patron Saint Vincenzo
on 22 January. When our musts have become wine we can finally share our experiences
of the past vintage. Like every year we talk about it now, before returning to the vineyard
to start again with the new pruning.

THE SEASONS 2023
Mild, snowless winter.
Cold and rainy spring: the swallows, they gave up their first brood….
they already knew the cold was coming…
The torrid summer with unprecedented overbearing and merciless heat…
…but… as always our vines found the June water at the bottom of the earth…
The harvest was poor for the red grapes; a richer harvest for the whites.
Few olives on the trees: the abundant flowering was decimated by the rains, so little oil.

NEWS
The vines at “Tre Marie”:
we planted one hectare of Vernaccia and Trebbiano on sandy, calcareous soil.
We bought Il Capanno di Natalino, ‘l’Amato’:
a hectare of abandoned land, close to the Fidanza vineyards, which we want to bring back to life.

SAN VINCENZO AND THE WINEGROWERS
In 1975, a group of winegrowers met for the first time in Montenidoli;
we wanted to get together to celebrate our hard work on the vintage that we had just completed.
Every year since then we have gathered, with our wines, to talk about our successes and difficulties,
to take courage and to face future challenges.
We live close to our land, we speak its language, and we know where to plant our vines.
The vine, the magical fruit of Ampelos, from its roots gives birth to grapes and the spirit of wine.
It knows how to transform matter into light; it is the fragrant nectar that creates divine harmonies.
“It enlightens the mind, warms the heart, invigorates the body” says St Bernard of Clairvaux.

THE FOUNDATION
On a happy island, surrounded by woods, above San Gimignano, facing Chianti Classico,
two groups of houses in this enchanted place await old and young people from all over the world.
They get to know each other, listen to each other, and become a ‘big family’, ambassadors
of sharing (experience, culture and knowledge) and peace.
There is also the farmhouse where professionals are welcome to hold meetings and seminars,
and to transmit new messages.
Georges Moustaki in 1972 composed ‘La Mediterranée’ and sang:
“…there are olive trees dying under the bombs, there where the first dove appeared….
…there is a beautiful summer that does not fear autumn in the Mediterranean…’

FROM PRODUCERS TO THE MARKET
We winegrowers carry the torch of life, of friendship, of good thoughts.
It is up to our importers to sell our bottles all over the world.
It is up to the journalists to hold high our flag, symbol of friendship, culture, and the future.