Adanti

The origins: 1970–1972

The project began around 1970 with Domenico Adanti’s decision to acquire the villa, house and land at Arquata. The property had long been abandoned, but Domenico saw the possibility of creating a modern winery devoted to high-quality wine. The Adanti family was also among the early local growers to recognize the potential of Sagrantino as a dry wine rather than solely as the traditional passito.

Azienda Agricola Adanti was formally founded in 1972. Domenico purchased and restored an ancient Celestine monastery surrounded by neglected vineyards. The building became the estate’s winery, while the abandoned vines were rehabilitated and new vineyards planted. Older descriptions place the structure over remains associated with the Roman and late-Renaissance periods.

Alvaro Palini and the transformation of Sagrantino: 1977–1980

In 1977 Domenico asked his friend Alvaro Palini to take charge of production. Palini was then living in Paris, where he worked as a tailor and had developed his palate through familiarity with French wine. His practical background in viticulture was limited to childhood experience with his grandfather and work in the small vineyard and cellar of the Bevagna orphanage.

Their collaboration began with unusual candour. Domenico took an early wine to Paris for Palini to assess; Palini found it so poor that he poured it into the sink. When repeated criticism finally led Domenico to challenge him to do better, Palini entered the cellar despite having no formal technical training.

The vineyards he encountered still reflected an older mixed-farming system. Fruit trees, figs and wheat grew between the rows, while old vineyards could contain a different variety at almost every vine. Sagrantino was traditionally dried for passito; any surplus might be added to red wine, and a consistently dry version had yet to become established.

Palini reduced excessive yields, introduced more attentive pruning and replaced undifferentiated harvesting with precise cluster selection. Grapes that were insufficiently ripe or otherwise unsuitable were left for other wines. He also changed vinification and maturation practices, seeking a better balance among fruit, tannin and acidity. Slow ageing in oak and further bottle maturation became central to the approach.

Adanti made its first Sagrantino in 1980. Palini’s work helped establish the robust but mature dry expression associated with the estate, with the 1985 vintage later cited as an important example of its capacity to age.

Family succession

Domenico remained a strongly present figure until his death. The transition that followed initially brought uncertainty. Management then passed to his brother Pietro, assisted first by Domenico’s daughter Donatella and later by her sister Daniela. Donatella and Daniela both became prominent in the estate’s management, while Pietro represented continuity with the founding generation.

A parallel succession occurred in the cellar. Alvaro Palini gradually handed operational responsibility to his son Daniele while retaining a supervisory role in vineyard and cellar quality. A 2014 account also identified Maurizio Castelli as the estate’s oenologist at that time.

The estate today

The current proprietors are Daniela Adanti and her daughter Stella, bringing together the second and third generations of the family. They continue to pursue selective production, careful handling of every product and respect for the territory’s inherited traditions.

The vineyards now cover approximately 30 ha across Arquata, Campoletame and Colcimino. Colcimino is treated as a distinct cru and contains the estate’s oldest vineyard. Alongside continuity, the modern phase has brought organic agriculture, photovoltaic energy and an emphasis on trained manual work throughout the vineyard cycle.

Adanti has adopted organic agriculture as part of its environmental programme. Vineyard work is directed toward maintaining a balanced relationship between vegetative growth and fruit production, preserving soil integrity and stimulating the vines’ natural defences so that fewer treatments are needed.

Manual work receives particular attention. Pruning and the meticulous, cluster-by-cluster harvest are carried out by personnel trained within the estate, whose long familiarity with the vineyards extends to individual plants.

Alvaro Palini’s historic approach established several enduring principles. He used more attentive pruning to control excessive production, removed surplus clusters when necessary and selected only the best bunches rather than applying a fixed cluster count. Unripe or unsuitable fruit was separated for other uses. For Palini, reduced yield was not an objective in itself: balance had to be judged in relation to each vintage, vine health and other changing conditions, and even a yield as low as 30 quintals per hectare could create imbalance.

The historic vineyards used a palmetta training system. Palini continued to favour it on level ground, arguing that approximately 3,000 vines per hectare could perform better there than densities of 5,000–6,000 while supplying a comparable quantity of fruit.

Photovoltaic generation makes the estate self-sufficient for its stated energy requirements, extending the sustainability programme beyond the vineyard.

The winery occupies the restored former monastery at Arquata and combines the estate’s historic setting with modern equipment. The production philosophy developed by Domenico Adanti and Alvaro Palini places vineyard quality and patient maturation ahead of corrective handling in the cellar.

Fruit from different vineyard areas is vinified separately and assigned to separate casks. The cellar has historically relied on large oak casks and tonneaux, supplemented by only a small number of barriques. Woods identified in this programme include medium-toast Tronçais oak and mountain-grown Slavonian oak. Allier was deliberately avoided because its vanilla character was considered too prominent. The separate components were traditionally assembled after Easter in a large cask.

Slow oak maturation and subsequent bottle ageing are fundamental to the estate’s handling of Sagrantino. Palini’s changes were intended to reconcile fruit, tannin and acidity without erasing the grape’s force. Later cellar practice continued to hold back Sagrantino longer than many contemporaries because additional bottle age was considered necessary.

Stainless-steel tanks are used for fermentation and maturation on the white-wine side of the range. The estate also maintains a historical archive of Montefalco Sagrantino vintages to follow their evolution and permit the later release of selected mature years.

Across the range, vinification is described as deliberately gentle, aiming to temper Sagrantino’s exuberance and bring forward Sangiovese while retaining an agile, measured style.