The Final Snapshot of a Vineyard Born Before Us
Some wines are born by choice, others by necessity. Il Guerrino 2022 was born from a single moment. From a thought that arrives suddenly—like when you lift your eyes and realize that you will never see that landscape in quite the same way again. It’s a wine that could not have been planned: it simply happened. And when things like this happen, they deserve to be heard.
Before it was a wine, Il Guerrino was a place. A small farmhouse and vineyard perched on a ridge descending toward the warm, sun-soaked “solatii” to the south, while on the opposite side it looks toward Montefioralle from what feels like a natural terrace suspended between two valleys. A spot seemingly designed for Sangiovese: wind, light, slope, and shade exactly when needed.
Two tiny vineyards stood there, together less than one hectare. We leased them more than ten years ago from the Taddei/Loretelli family, who proudly told us how their own Chianti Classico “Il Guerrino” once came from those very vines. Planted in the late 1930s—very likely older than Fernando—they were a maze of ancient trunks, twisted plants, and rows so narrow that even imagination couldn’t squeeze a tractor through.
(The Guerrino vineyard with Montefioralle in the distance)
But that Sangiovese spoke. We understood it immediately. We used it in our Riserva from the very first year: it brought depth, character, that faint touch of austerity that makes a wine interesting—maybe not at the first sip, perhaps at the third or fourth—and then you’re sorry when the bottle is already gone. It was living, precious material.
Yet every choice comes with a cost. Those vines demanded everything and gave less each year. Pitiful yields: 10 quintals… then 8… then just 6 in 2021. And everything done by hand—treatments, pruning, harvest. Every grape was an achievement. And, as it often happens, the moment arrived when reality outweighed romance: those vines had reached the end of their life cycle. Together with the owners, we decided it was time to uproot and replant, reclaiming ground from the woods that had slowly crept over the vineyard boundaries.
The 2022 harvest would be the last for that eighty-year-old vineyard.
That morning, as we walked up with the team toward Il Guerrino, I ran into Valerio—the father of Elisabetta, our agronomist and oenological consultant. A man who knows this land so well he can read and recount its moods. He was returning from hunting, stopped for a moment, looked at the vines, and simply said:
“It’s a pity to remove them. I understand why you have to, but this biodiversity… it’s truly something special.”
Those words hit me the way only simple truths can. A second later, the decision was made: the last harvest from Il Guerrino would not go into the Riserva. It would have its own space, its own voice, its own liquid memory.
(Harvest 2022 at Il Guerrino)
Barely five quintals of grapes. A small fermenter. A separate vinification.
A single barrique.
One final snapshot.
The result is Il Guerrino 2022 — a Chianti Classico limited to only 300 bottles, the final breath of a vineyard born before World War II, shaped by the Tramontana winds, and standing for eighty years overlooking Montefioralle.
This is not a wine meant to be over-explained. It is a wine meant to be listened to.
And we chose to leave it exactly as it was: honest, intact, impossible to repeat.
A limited edition reserved exclusively for our Wine Club members: a fragment of agricultural history, a farewell and a new beginning at the same time.
Because some vineyards don’t truly disappear when they are uprooted. They live on in the bottles they leave behind.
And Il Guerrino 2022 is its final, beautiful salute.