Italy's natural wine movement occupies a specific position in the global natural wine conversation: Italy has the world's most varied collection of indigenous grape varieties, some of the world's oldest uninterrupted winemaking traditions, and a wine culture that has always had a segment that worked outside the industrial mainstream. The "natural wine" label, wines made with minimal intervention, no added sulfites or with very limited additions, no commercial yeast, no fining or filtration, from organically or biodynamically grown grapes, arrived in Italy from France (where the mouvement naturel emerged from Lyon's bar culture in the 1980s) but found a country with pre-existing traditions of wild-fermented, unfiltered wine that predated the natural wine movement by centuries. The Friulian skin-contact wines of Joško Gravner and Stanko Radikon were not "natural wine" when they were made in the 1990s. They were simply how Gravner and Radikon had always made wine, before the French concept arrived to provide a marketing category for what they were doing.
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Italy's Most Important Natural Wine Producers
Joško Gravner (Friuli-Venezia Giulia)
Gravner is the most internationally discussed Italian natural wine producer, the Brda hills winemaker who abandoned modern winemaking entirely in the late 1990s, traveling to Georgia to study the 8,000-year-old qvevri (clay amphora) tradition, and returning to Friuli to make his Ribolla Gialla and Breg (Sauvignon blend) with 6-7 months of skin maceration in buried Georgian amphora. The result: wines of extraordinary amber color, tannic structure, and oxidative complexity that bear no resemblance to conventional white wine. Gravner's production is small. His wines are sold on allocation and are expensive (€60-120 per bottle). The estate is in Oslavia, near Gorizia, visits by appointment, strongly recommended for any serious wine traveler in Friuli.
Radikon (Friuli-Venezia Giulia)
Stanko Radikon's estate in Oslavia, now run by his son Saša after Stanko's death in 2016, produces the other reference point for Friulian orange wine. Ribolla Gialla and Jakot (Tocai Friulano) macerated on skins for 3-6 weeks, then aged in large oak barrels for 3 years, producing wines of deep amber color, rich textural complexity, and extraordinary aging potential. The Radikon wines come in the distinctive small-format bottles (half-liter and one-liter, not the standard 750ml) that Stanko designed to encourage drinking wine in larger pours rather than the smaller conventional glass size. Available at Italian natural wine bars and direct from the estate.
COS (Sicily)
The Sicilian cooperative-turned-estate of Giambattista Cilia, Cirino Strano, and Giusto Occhipinti that pioneered biodynamic viticulture in Sicily from the early 1990s. COS's Cerasuolo di Vittoria Classico (Nero d'Avola and Frappato, the only DOCG in Sicily) and their experimental amphora-aged whites and reds represent the application of natural wine principles to specifically Sicilian material with results of genuine quality. The Pithos (clay amphora) wines have made COS internationally recognized. The Cerasuolo di Vittoria Classico is the most reliably available product at accessible prices.
Cornelissen (Sicily. Etna)
Frank Cornelissen, the Belgian négociant-turned-Etna-farmer who has been making wine from Nerello Mascalese on the Etna volcano since 2001, represents the most internationally discussed Etna natural wine producer. His Magma (single vineyard, old vine Nerello Mascalese) and the MunJebel range (site-specific bottlings from different Etna contrade) apply minimal-intervention principles to volcanic terroir with results that command international auction prices and critical attention disproportionate to the production volume.
Q&A: Italian Natural Wine
What is orange wine and is it all natural wine?
Orange wine is white wine made with extended skin contact, the grape skins remain in contact with the juice during fermentation, extracting tannins, color (from the orange/amber pigments in white grape skins), and textural compounds that are absent in conventionally made white wine. All natural wine made from white grapes with skin contact is orange wine. Not all orange wine is natural (the skin contact technique can be applied with commercial additions, conventional filtration, and sulfite additions while still producing an orange-colored wine). The Friulian tradition (Gravner, Radikon, Princic, Zidarich) and the Georgian origin of the technique are the primary historical references. Contemporary orange wine is produced globally.
Where are the best natural wine bars in Italy?
Milan: Trippa (Via Giorgio Vasari 1), the most discussed natural wine osteria (simple traditional eatery) in Milan, with a wine list of 400+ natural producers.Vino al Vino (Via Abbondio Sangiorgio). Rome: Faro (Via Piave 55), the Pigneto bar that roasts its own coffee and curates a serious natural wine list.Il Sorì (Via Rasella 45). Florence: Il Santino (Via di Santo Spirito 60), the wine bar annex of Il Santo Bevitore, with one of the best natural wine lists in Tuscany. These bars are gathering points for the local wine community. The list behind the bar is often more interesting than the menu on the chalk board.
Internal Links
- Italian Wine Regions: Natural Wine Geography
- Veneto Wine: Conventional and Natural Contrasted
- Etna Natural Wine: Cornelissen in Context
- Friuli Agriturismo: Staying Near Gravner and Radikon
- Natural Wine Harvest: The Farming Philosophy Behind the Wine
- Natural Wine to Bring Home: The Storage Considerations
- Italian Natural Wine Bars: The Indoors Alternative
