Storia
The Rizzardi estate in Negrar, 1649–1678
In 1649 Carlo Rizzardi moved from Toscolano Maderno to Valpolicella. He acquired a property in Negrar that already included a vineyard and cellar, establishing the Rizzardi family estate in the area. The first wines bearing the Rizzardi name followed in 1678. Agriculture at Negrar was initially diverse: the family managed arable fields, forage crops, woodland, vines, olives and fruit trees rather than operating an exclusively viticultural property.
Pojega and the expansion of the estate, 1783–19th century
In 1783 Count Antonio Rizzardi commissioned the Veronese architect Luigi Trezza to create the Garden of Pojega at the heart of the agricultural estate. Conceived as a setting for leisure and entertainment, the garden was laid out between 1783 and 1796. Its formal Italian geometry was combined with the emerging picturesque sensibility of Romanticism, using perspective avenues, hedges, water, sculpture and architecture to shape the landscape. The original drawings are preserved in the Biblioteca Civica di Verona.
The family enlarged the Negrar property in 1810 by purchasing additional nearby vineyards. Viticultural expansion continued during the 19th century, including land on the hills of Calcarole and around Rovereti. Villa Rizzardi, the 19th-century residence beside the garden, became the principal house at the centre of the estate; it underwent restoration during the 1850s. The rustic buildings of the historic courtyard housed the wine cellars.
The creation of Guerrieri Rizzardi, 1913–1914
In 1913 Carlo Rizzardi married Giuseppina Guerrieri, the last descendant of the Guerrieri family. Her dowry included vineyards and wineries in Bardolino and Val d’Adige. The marriage united the two families under the Guerrieri Rizzardi name, and the first vintage carrying the combined name was 1914.
Specialisation after the Second World War
From the 1950s, engineer Count Antonio Rizzardi, son of Carlo Rizzardi and Giuseppina Guerrieri, managed and developed the family farms. He progressively replaced the former polyculture with more specialised vine growing. Family members remained personally involved in vineyard and cellar work, particularly during harvest.
After Antonio’s death in 1983, Contessa Maria Cristina Loredan Rizzardi assumed responsibility for the family business. She expanded the vineyards, developed new wines and pursued international markets. From 1985 she applied the concept of the cru as a quality expression tied to a precisely defined vineyard, an approach particularly relevant to the named sites of the Negrar estate.
New varieties and individual vineyards, late 1990s–2006
Giuseppe, Orsola, Olimpia and Agostino Rizzardi—the third generation of the combined Guerrieri Rizzardi company—began joining the business in the late 1990s. New vineyards and varieties were matched to soil characteristics, training systems were refined, and control of the entire estate-grown and estate-bottled production chain remained a central objective.
Merlot was planted in the historic, walled Rovereti vineyard from the late 1990s after the variety proved well adapted to its climate and red-clay soil. The first Clos Roareti vintage was produced in 2006. This became an estate expression outside the traditional Valpolicella blends, produced only when the Merlot reaches the desired level of quality.
Thirteenth-generation stewardship and sustainability
The family business is now led by Agostino and Giuseppe Rizzardi, representing the 13th generation of the Rizzardi family. Vineyard management has developed around parcel-specific work, yield control, permanent or sown ground cover, reduced herbicide use, support for beneficial insects and biodiversity, and limited emergency irrigation. The organization began implementing the Equalitas SOPD sustainability system in November 2023 and subsequently obtained Equalitas certification under Certificate of Conformity No. 84222/20241107.
Restoration and renewed public role, 2022–2026
The Garden of Pojega underwent almost three years of restoration and enhancement supported by Italy’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan. The work followed Luigi Trezza’s original designs, restored paths and botanical balance, introduced agapanthus, irises, tulips and 21,000 daffodils of three types, and recovered more than 60 stone sculptures attributed to Pietro Muttoni. The restored garden reopened on 1 April 2025 with new accessibility provisions, including Italian Sign Language videos, tactile Braille panels and an audio guide with a children’s version.
In 2026 the estate continued developing the garden as a cultural and social space through the Therapeutic Garden Days, organized with IRCCS Sacro Cuore Don Calabria Hospital and the Municipality of Negrar di Valpolicella. The 2026 programme addressed aphasia and brought together patients, caregivers, healthcare professionals, associations and visitors. Part of the proceeds was allocated to A.IT.A. Veneto to support people living with aphasia and their families.
Terroir
Position and landscape
The estate’s vineyards and cellar are in Negrar di Valpolicella, one of the five municipalities included in the Valpolicella Classico zone. The vineyards occupy a hilly landscape between approximately 170 and 230 metres above sea level. The surrounding countryside is formed by small hills planted with vines, olives and cherry trees. Its climate is influenced by the mountains and the proximity of Lake Garda.
The estate contains both hillside vineyards shaped by erosion and lower valley-floor sites near pre-Alpine streams running broadly north–south. Soils are generally fairly deep, predominantly clay-textured, with little coarse skeletal material, high limestone content and moderate drainage.
Estate soils and mesoclimates
Clay and limestone define the broad estate profile, but named sites show important variations. Calcarole is a terraced hillside vineyard reaching 230 metres, with a particularly warm mesoclimate, calcareous and pebbly ground, and a south-west exposure. Pojega, beside the historic garden, has clay-sandy soil with a medium limestone content. The walled Rovereti vineyard has red clay and clay-sandy soil with high limestone and notable magnesium, iron and zinc content; Merlot has been cultivated there since the late 1990s.
Soil analyses are normally conducted every four years and always before a new vineyard is planted, informing both site preparation and initial fertilisation.
Vinificazione
Vineyard work is organized parcel by parcel. Each plot receives a dedicated supervision programme, and grape maturity is monitored to determine harvest timing. Pruning is meticulous and generally retains only one cane per vine under a simple Guyot approach, limiting the number of bunches. Further operations are tailored to each parcel to reach the intended crop level; control of yield per hectare is treated as a central quality measure.
All vineyards maintain ground cover with spontaneous plants, sometimes supplemented by sown melliferous species. Peas, vetch and clovers are also planted between rows; after mowing in summer, their biomass acts as natural fertiliser. Ground cover is intended to reduce surface erosion on slopes, improve soil bearing capacity, limit compaction, strengthen physical and microbiological fertility, support biodiversity and provide resources for pollinating insects.
Shrubs and trees selected to attract beneficial insects have been planted along vineyard edges, helping reduce reliance on artificial pest-control products. Weed-control intervention outside the Bardolino zone—including the Negrar vineyards—is confined to a narrow strip and limited to no more than two interventions annually; mechanical weeding is used in some vineyards.
Irrigation is reserved for emergency support. Water may be applied through mobile sprinklers monitored by rain gauges, under-canopy microjets or drip lines, with quantities calculated from operating pressure and flow tables. Supplies come from authorized wells and reclamation consortia, and wells are metered. Under normal conditions, two or three applications between berry growth in mid-June and the onset of veraison at the end of July are considered sufficient for balanced production.
Before a machine harvest, damaged or underripe bunches are removed manually. Where harvesting is performed by hand, the fruit receives rigorous visual selection. Family members take part in vineyard and cellar work during harvest, alongside a team combining younger and experienced personnel.
The estate is included within the organization’s Equalitas sustainability system. The management system began in November 2023 and covers vineyard land, cellars, bottling and administrative activities. Equalitas certification was subsequently achieved under Certificate of Conformity No. 84222/20241107.
Vinification takes place in the estate cellar at Negrar so that grapes travel only a short distance from vineyard to production area. Work follows precise protocols adapted to individual varieties; these protocols define the stages, operating methods and records and are reviewed annually. The stated stylistic objectives are finesse, elegance, balance and distinct personality.
The estate retains control of an estate-grown and estate-bottled production chain. Cellar operations follow formal good-practice procedures and some practices derived from organic production. Potable water is used for equipment cleaning and sanitation, with defined protocols governing frequency, detergents and water consumption.
For Amarone production, hand-selected grapes are naturally dried for several months in boxes in the nearby drying facility. Drying concentrates their sugars and aromas before pressing and fermentation. The wines then undergo extended maturation in oak. Calcarole fruit comes from mature, naturally low-yielding vines and is picked by hand at the ripeness considered suitable for drying.
Ripasso is produced by refermenting Valpolicella on the pomace remaining after Amarone is racked. Alcoholic and malolactic fermentations take place in tank; the secondary spring fermentation on Amarone pomace is followed by maturation in European and French oak barrels and tonneaux. Oak ageing of the Pojega expression lasts 12 months.
The organization operates its own bottling line and schedules bottling runs according to production and market requirements. Lightweight glass is chosen for almost all wines, while glass, cork, paper, cardboard and plastic used in daily operations are separated for recycling.
Filosofia
The family defines its production philosophy through the relationship between land, history and tradition while accepting innovations that improve quality. Varieties and new plantings are matched to soil characteristics rather than selected solely through convention, and both regional and international grapes are used where they are considered capable of adding complexity and intensity.
Quality begins with direct control: the vineyards and cellars remain family-owned and family-run, the wines are estate grown and bottled, and family members work alongside the teams during harvest. Each parcel is treated individually, yields are deliberately controlled, and the cru is understood as a qualitative expression of a clearly delimited vineyard.
The desired wine style emphasizes finesse, elegance, balance and capacity for ageing. Current leadership frames the future as a combination of preserving tradition, innovating responsibly and treating wine as a cultural, social and human experience. Sustainability extends from soil and biodiversity management to reduced inputs, emergency-only irrigation, recycling, lighter bottles and formal Equalitas management.