Albatreti

Montalcino, Toscana

Albatreti is a relatively new Brunello label, first released in 2008 by Gaetano Salvioni. Cousin to Guilio Salvioni of La Cerbaiola, Gaetano Salvinoni trained as a fine artist in Florence and returned home to Montalcino, where he opened a small electronics shop. Working the small vineyards owned by his mother and father had always been a part of Gaetano’s life, even if it was only on the weekends for the pleasure of it.

In 1985, there was a terrible frost. On a property belonging to the family of Gaetano’s wife, the storm destroyed 1000 olive trees. A tiny number of old grapevines survived. Nearly abandoned, the hill was overtaken by a thicket of Corbezzolo, or Albatro, a local wild bush that is called in English the strawberry tree. Gaetano slowly began to hack away the thicket to reach the galestro-rich, southwest-exposed site at 400-500 meters elevation. He planted two and a half hectares in 1999, followed by two more five years later. After some years of selling grapes to others, he has finally begun to share his own wines, a fragrant, fresh juicy Rosso and a Brunello with stunning aromatic profile and texture.