Azienda Agricola Malgiacca - Saverio Petrilli, Lisandro Carmazzi, Luigi Fenoglio, Sarah Richards & Ettore Petrilli
WEAK JACKET.
We cultivate 9 hectares of vineyards divided into many parcels in the Gragnano area on the Lucchesi Hills (LU) the smallest is 1200 meters the largest is 1 and a half hectares, the oldest is 50 years old the youngest 7.
TARGETS.
I've been working in the Lucchesi Hills since 1994, before I didn't know the area, I started with conventional agriculture, in 1997 I switched to organic farming because I saw that the plants were suffering, the old vines were dying, the young ones weren't growing and the diseases were epidemic. I can't say I solved the problems but at least I didn't use those boxes with the skull and crossbones anymore and I spent less.
Then, in 2001, I met Alex Podolinsky and I started practicing biodynamic agriculture. In just a few years everything changed, the vines were so healthy that I only dealt with milk, Nature responded very well and the wines became more expressive, lighter and much more drinkable.
Our will is to transfer the purest expression of our terroir into the bottles.
VINEYARDS.
We directly manage all the vineyards, learning their individual specificity. We pay close attention to the application of the Bd preparations that I personally produce with another nearby farmer, for us and for the entire LuccaBioDinamica network. I spray over 100 acres of land alone with an ATV every year; two applications of 500P and 1 to 3 applications of 501. For pruning we follow the lunar cycle. As treatments we use milk, copper under 2 kg/ha/year and sulfur combined with zeolite and kaolin to control leafhopper. In autumn we often re-plot the land and sometimes sow a mixture of legumes, cruciferous plants and grasses which we transform into a permanent lawn.
CELLAR.
Let's pick ripe grapes! We destem it by hand on a rack and we vinify it in 10hl vats after having stamped it with our feet. We also use two amphorae, one in stoneware and one in terracotta made by an artist friend of ours. In winemaking we do not use anything. Neither sulfur nor yeast. The first addition of sulfur dioxide takes place after the malolactic fermentation. The Malgiacca white is fermented and aged in steel, the Tingolli fermented and aged in stoneware, wood, cement, assembled before bottling. For the reds; the Dalìtro matures in concrete. The Malgiacca red matures in barriques that we keep for years. The transfers take place with compressed air without the use of a pump. Chlorine-free well water and no chemical detergents are used for all cleaning operations.
We do the bottling directly with small machines. No plastic is used in packaging.