Proprietà Sperino

Luca de Marchi has Piedmontese roots, but grew up in the middle of the Sangiovese stronghold on the estate of his father Isole e Olena in Chianti Classico. With a Tuscan accent, he explains with a grin: "I don't make wine, I produce Nebbiolo." No wonder the 35-year-old settled in northern Piedmont after studying linguistics and ended up becoming a winemaker, because the crazy passion for wine clearly runs in the family. Instead of going into well-deserved retirement, father Paolo took on a new project with his son in 1999: The rebuilding of the inherited vineyard in Lessona is the realisation of a childhood dream and the recovery of the historic family fortune of the de Marchis.

The Proprietà Sperino winery is located in the Lessona DOC appellation, which is one of the oldest wine-growing regions in Italy. As early as the 14th century, this area produced high quality Nebbiolo wines, which for the first time brought the aromatic profile of the grape variety, locally called Spanna, into focus. The wines were already in great demand at that time and it was not for nothing that a glass of Lessona was served in 1861 as a toast to the unity of Italy.

In the 19th century, the vineyard area of the appellation was larger than the Barbaresco area, with about a thousand hectares. However, after the Second World War, cultivation difficulties and the emergence of the textile and metal industry led to the gradual abandonment of wine production in Lessona, so that the area under cultivation in 2000 was only 2.5 hectares.

The father-son team of the de Marchis, obsessed with quality, has been driving the Lessona DOC appellation, which had fallen into oblivion, forward for twenty years with a focus on success, so that today it once again has 30 hectares of vineyards. 12 hectares of vineyards belong to the Proprietà Sperino, 10 of which are planted directly in Lessona.

In any case, nothing is left to chance in the de Marchis, even the humus is produced with specially bred Californian earthworms, and the agronomic management of the vineyards takes 1,000 working hours per hectare every year. Almost everything is therefore done by hand and no herbicides or chemical fertilizers are used.

The unique soil structure of the area was reason enough for Luca de Marchi to laboriously restore the vineyards. Right at the foot of Monte Rosa, the soil consists of marine sand and Alpine granite and has one of the lowest pH values in the world (pH 4.5-5.5). The soil is rich in minerals such as potassium and magnesium, which give the wines their typical mineral and salty notes, while the sandy subsoil provides a pleasantly fine structure.

The grapes ferment in the historic Castello di Lessona: an impressive estate that looks back on a hundred years of history of the Sperino family's dynasty of doctors. 1904 was the last vintage that a Sperino had bottled before the estate was bequeathed to the de Marchis. Father and son carried on the impressive family heritage, bringing back a Lessona DOC from the Propietà Sperino almost a century later.

Luca den Marchi is convinced "that Lessona and northern Piedmont have a bright future ahead of them". His Lessona DOC wine has a unique finesse that a varietal Nebbiolo can only produce in this area. The work in the cellar is also characterised by the precise extraction of tannins, as known from the expert hand of his father. And in addition to the blend Uvaggio Coste della Sesia DOC, the young oenologist also produces a fruity, fresh rosé from Nebbiolo and Vespolina grapes - and only in the best years a pure Cabernet Franc, which you have to look for in the trade with a magnifying glass.

Compared to the southern Nebbiolo cousins Barolo and Barbaresco, the wines from the north present themselves much more filigree and aromatic. With the philosophy of "only remaining faithful to history and not imitating other oenological styles", Luca and Paolo de Marchi create exciting and guaranteed unique wines from Lessona, which one does not want to miss under any circumstances. SUPERIORE.DE