Founded in the 1920s’ by great-grandfather Bepi, Claudio Mariotto’s family have been making wine in the Tortona hills of Piedmont for generations. Today the winery is run and managed by Claudio, with the help of his partner Rossana, his brother Marco and his mother Piera. They have 100 hectares of land, 50 of which are planted with vines. Located in the municipalities of Tortona and Sarezzano, they work solely with native grape varieties, including Freisa, Croatina, and Barbera, but their real focus, their passion, and the majority of their production is dedicated to Timorasso.

Once on the verge of extinction, Timorasso is a native Piedmontese varietal, which thanks to producers like Claudio Mariotto, is more recently seeing a revival in plantings and popularity. Rather than opting for Cortese, which was the preferred white of the area, Claudio saw potential in Timorasso and made it his mission to showcase its ability to produce premium quality wines of distinction. Claudio conducted thorough research into how to manage this notoriously difficult varietal, and in turn has become a benchmark producer of this varietal, producing authentic wines, with lots of personality.

The wines take their names from the areas where the vineyards are located. Bricco San Michele is a young vineyard near the Municipality of Sarezzano. Derthona was the Roman name for the city of Tortona, the wine is a blend of the best grapes from all their vineyards surrounding Tortono. And Cavallina is from a 5 hectare plot of older vines in the Vho area, the wines from here have great aging potential.

It rarely happens that we are all bowled over by a set of wines, but we certainly were in this case, these wines show concentration, minerality, complexity, typicity, and impeccable wood integration. A stunning line-up.