The Wine Cellar
The Wine Cellar
Our cellar is not hidden away. It is walk-in, kept at a constant temperature, and you are welcome to step inside and look around. In the cellar stands the cabinet where the Chianina beef ages on the bone for three to six weeks at 2 to 3 degrees, in plain sight. Two things that need time, kept in one place.
A vertical that begins in 1888
At its centre is a vertical of Biondi-Santi, the house in Montalcino where Brunello was invented. It begins where the wine itself begins: with a bottle of the Riserva 1888 – the first Brunello di Montalcino ever made, and therefore the oldest vintage of this wine in existence. Beside it stands the bottle Biondi-Santi filled a hundred years later in its honour, 1888–1988.
The Riservas
Then the Riservas: 1945. 1946. 1955 – the vintage Wine Spectator counted among the twelve wines of the twentieth century. 1970. 1971. The 1975.
Topped up before a notary
The 1945 and the 1971 carry a certificate on the back that tells the story better than any description could. On 26 June 1993, in the central cell of the Il Greppo cellar in Montalcino, they were opened, examined, topped up with wine of the same vintage and re-corked – before a notary, signed by Franco Biondi Santi himself. A house does that only for wines it expects to outlive us.
Ask us
Beside them stand current rarities and a selection built up bottle by bottle over decades. Ask us. We are happy to open something you have not had before.