Còlpetrone is the largest private estate producing Montefalco Sagrantino.
There is no doubt that Sagrantino has undergone a decisive impulse in its production and even more from the qualitative point of view between the end of the 80s and the early 90s, when some wineries, like Còlpetrone, understanding the incredible but still unexpressed potential of wine, decided to invest significantly in the territory and at the same time in research on the existing products and oenological practices, defining new standards and focusing their analysis on the dry type compared to the traditional and historical version, Sagrantino passito.
A path that for our estate began with a few hectares, to arrive today to a completely new reality of over 140 hectares, of which 63 are vineyards and of these 35 to Sagrantino, which place Còlpetrone as one of the major producers of Sagrantino .
For some years now we have been experimenting with Còlpetrone what we have called the "third way of Sagrantino": we start from a maturation of the grapes pushed to the extreme limit (being careful not to fall into over-maturation). The bunches enjoy total exposure to the heat of the sun, thanks to a careful management of the spurred cordon. This system of vine breeding is commonly used for Sagrantino, because the vine requires exposure to the light of the bunches, while the Guyot creates shading situations. In the plant a thinning of 50% of the bunches is made when the grapes have reached 80% of the natural ripening. In particular, the clusters that are more distant from the stem are cut off, those that would have more difficulty absorbing the potassium. The latter, in fact, confers "character" to the grapes, but it is not easy to assimilate, so it takes great care to capture it in the clusters closest to the trunk, so as not to disperse it.
Finally, these selected and rich grapes are vinified with a different process from the normal one: they separate the skins during the fermentation (when only 70% of the sugars has already been transformed into alcohol), then 30% of the "new" Sagrantino ferments without peels, to avoid excessive polyphenol coordination. The result? Richness of not ripe tannins, with a more ready and really enjoyable wine.
Còlpetrone is also one of the wineries of the Wine Research Team project, a group of over 30 Italian and foreign estates united by a constant commitment to scientific research, to sustainability, applied to wine production; the Committee of the Wine Research Team, made up of technicians and researchers of reference in the Italian and international viticultural-enological context, is always in constant contact, developing collaborations and applied research for years, a guarantee in terms of convergence on specific addresses and paths to be undertaken; The last example of this important work is the operative protocol developed for winemaking in the absence of added sulphites, which opens paths and develops really interesting scenarios.
