“Cantine d’Italia” 2022 by Go Wine: with San Felice there are 16 "super excellences" of wine tourism

If wine tourism has become one of the pillars of tourism in the Italian territories, the credit is mainly due to companies and wineries that have made hospitality one of their most important assets. And to line up the best, in this sense, is “Cantine d’Italia” 2022, the latest edition of the “Guide for the wine tourist”, edited by Go Wine, unique in its kind, which, with its “Footprints”, signals excellence, which is increasingly widespread throughout the country, as they tell in numbers, with 820 selected wineries and 245 “Footprints of Excellence” for wine tourism (in addition to 4,400 wines reported and 1,500 useful addresses for eating and sleeping). 16, in all, are the realities that reach the top of the “Three Go Wine Footprints”, with the San Felice winery of the Allianz group, in Chianti Classico, which, in this edition, joins the other “super excellences” already awarded and confirmed, namely, again from Tuscany, Badia a Coltibuono, Capezzana and Castello Vicchiomaggio, Lombardy’s and Franciacorta’s Bellavista and Ca’ del Bosco, Piedmont’s Ceretto, Fontanafredda and Malvirà, Sicily’s Donnafugata, Planeta and Florio, and again Feudi di San Gregorio in Campania, Ferrari in Trentino, Lungarotti in Umbria and Masciarelli in Abruzzo.
Four wineries already in the Guide that obtain the “Footprint” recognition for the first time, namely Michele Chiarlo in Piedmont, Il Palagione in Tuscany, Felline in Apulia and Contini Attilio in Sardinia, 8 those debuting directly with the “Footprint”: Castello di Ama, Castello di Poppiano, Fontodi and San Felice in Tuscany, Cantina Tramin and Tenuta Kornell in Alto Adige, Di Majo Norante in Molise and Firriato in Sicily. Tuscany leads this special ranking with 53 “Footprints”, followed by Piedmont (43) and Veneto (34).
8 special awards from “Cantine d’Italia” 2022. The “Alto Confort” award for Corporate Relay of the Year goes to AgriRelais Baglio di Pianetto of the Sicilian winery Baglio di Pianetto in Santa Cristina Gela, the “Cantine Golose” award for Corporate Table of the Year to Vineria De Tarczal of the De Tarczal winery in Isera, Trentino, Italy, “Cantine Meravigliose” award for Enoarchitecture of the Year goes to Marchesi Alfieri of San Martino Alfieri, Piedmont; the “Enoculture” award, on the other hand, is for Fattoria dei Barbi’s Montalcino and Brunello Community Museum in Montalcino, Tuscany; the “Autoctono si nasce” award is for Alto Adige St. Magdalener Classico Moar from Cantina Produttori in Bolzano, South Tyrol, while the award “Buono… non lo conoscevo!” is for Barbagia Igt Granazza by Sedilesu of Mamoiada, in Sardinia, the “Vini Storici d’Italia” award goes to Sforzato di Valtellina Sfursat 5 Stelle by Nino Negri (of Gruppo Italiano Vini - Giv) of Chiuro, in Lombardy, and, finally, the “Gioacchino La Franca” award, recognition from the Go Wine member community for the winery experience of the year goes to “Il Palagione” of San Gimignano, in Tuscany.
“Footprints”, GoWine recalls, are awards given to wineries that score high in the overall assessment on site, reception and production profile. These are the three factors on which the presentation of the individual wineries is composed and on which their evaluation is defined: “the site” (the place where the winery is located, also looking at the winery itself from an architectural point of view; but also site to be understood as the overall heritage of vineyards that the winery has), “the reception” (the winery's vocation to “open” itself to the outside public with a parallel activity, whether in the receptive sphere agritourism, B&b or catering, as well as carrying out cultural initiatives that address the outside world) and “the wine” (the winery’s production profile assessed over time, beyond the outcome of a single harvest; taking into account the character of the production, the excellence of certain labels, the special care towards specific types of wines).
“There is an underlying goal that animates this Guide”, says Massimo Corrado, president and editorial director of Go Wine, “to tell through the Italy of wine a beautiful idea of Italy, one of the most beautiful faces of our country. Vineyard and wine lead us to every region, to so many sites and corners of the country. The winery is the destination, the animated place where stories of wines and people intertwine, where wine is the key to listening to the story of a place, a land, breathing its atmosphere”.
The volume opens with two “Windows on Wine”, introductory speeches by journalist Leila Salimbeni (Spirito DiVino) and television and radio host Nicola “Tinto” Prudente. Also under the banner of the storytelling theme, and renewing an approach already practiced in previous editions, the volume opens with ten interviews with men and women of wine, exponents of wineries selected in the Guide. They are: Mariuccia Borio, Cascina Castlèt (Piedmont), Ottavia Giorgi di Vistarino, Conte Vistarino (Lombardy), Armando Castagnedi, Tenuta Sant’Antonio (Veneto), Michele Moschioni, Moschioni (Friuli Venezia Giulia), Giovanni Busi, Travignoli (Tuscany), Omero Moretti, Moretti Omero (Umbria), Sergio Mottura, Mottura (Lazio), Gregory Perrucci, Felline (Puglia), Erminia and Rocco d’Angelo, D’Angelo (Basilicata), Piero Canopoli and Giuliana Dalla Longa, Murales (Sardinia).