Investments: Vallepicciola has opened its new 20 million euro winery. Focus on hospitality

Inaugurating a new winery is always a sign of vitality, and a sign of trust in the wine world. It is an important signal, especially in uncertain times like these. As often happens, when one has created a great wine, the inauguration is only the end product of a monumental job made up of exciting ideas, projects and investments. This is the case of the new 6.000 square meter winery in Castelnuovo Berardegna that Vallepicciola, Bruno Bolfo's winery (entrepreneur in the steel sector of the leading company Duferco) opened in the heart of Chianti Classico - 105 hectares of vineyards on 265 hectares of total land. The project of the winery, designed by the architect Margherita Gozzi, focusing on sustainability and integration with the landscape of one of the most beautiful wine territories in the world, Gallo Nero, started from an investment of 20 million euros and has taken 6 years of work.
The winery, inaugurated a few days ago, is on two floors underground, where all the stages of wine production take place, and on an above ground floor where the wine shop, tasting rooms and commercial offices are located. There is a photovoltaic system on the roof of the building, which means the winery energy wise is self-sufficient, and also it will be able to manage all production procedures (with the excellent advice of Riccardo Cotarella) when it is at maximum activity, producing from 350.000 to 600.000 bottles per year. Sustainability has been the number one focus, and the goal is to completely eliminate the use of herbicides and chemical treatments in the vineyard within the next 2 years.
“We have completed our winery project that we started in 2011. First we invested in the vineyards and in production, and then in wine tourism hospitality, because it is essential to welcome those who come to visit our territories from around the world”, Alberto Colombo, CEO of the winery, told WineNews, “because wine lovers from every corner of the planet visit here every year. Not now, of course, even though we are seeing a little bit of tourism coming back to the area again, but we must be positive, the world will start moving again, and this new step gives us the impulse to do better what we are already doing. It is an investment that will improve production management because we only work with proprietary grape varieties. More importantly, its aim is to grow wine tourism and the hospitality aspect for presentations and not only, in the spaces we have, and in synergy with the neighbor Resort Le Fontanelle, which the Bolfo family also owns”.