Produttori del Barbaresco

Barbaresco , as a wine, has its own specific date of birth: in fact, in 1894 Domizio Cavazza , then principal of the Royal Enological School of Alba and owner of the Castle of Barbaresco (and of the adjoining agricultural company), created from scratch the « Cellars Sociali di Barbaresco » for the «production of luxury and table wines». It was already known, previously, that the Nebbiolo grown in Barbaresco, and in the neighboring municipalities, had distinctive characteristics compared to the Nebbiolo from Barolo , grown a few kilometers from there, but Cavazza was the first to recognize this peculiarity on the label. Before that date, the Nebbiolo grown in the area was sold to produce Barolo wine or vinified as a simple table wine. The cooperative began to make wine in the cellars of the Castle and to name the wine with the name of the town itself, Barbaresco precisely. He gathered 9 farmers and vineyard owners and thus began the production of this small ante litteram social winery. Cavazza disappeared in 1913 and the winery was still active for about ten years, then it met the same end. But the foundations had been laid. We have to wait for 1958 and the intervention of a very active priest, Don Fiorino Marengo, then parish priest of Barbaresco, who, referring to that old tradition, brought together 19 farmers and re-founded the cooperative winery with the name of " Producers of Barbaresco " «for the qualification and guarantee of Barbaresco", as he himself expressed it, to motivate the reconstitution of the cooperative. Objectives fully achieved and still being pursued: thanks to the dedication and work of the winemakers who created it, Produttori del Barbaresco has long been considered among the most prestigious wineries in the denomination and in Italy; today it has 50 contributing members, with around 110 hectares of Nebbiolo vineyards in the historic crus of the area. Produzione del Barbaresco produces only Nebbiolo grapes, producing various Crus of Barbaresco DOCG with the name of the Cru and the owners of the vineyards themselves reported on the numbered labels. A Nebbiolo Langhe DOC is added with grapes from the same vineyards, judged less suitable for producing an aging wine, therefore producing a simpler and more ready-to-drink wine.