Cafaggio

Medieval origins

Cafaggio’s documented history begins in 1408. A parchment preserved in the estate archive records the property under the name Cahago, meaning an enclosed, cultivated field.

By the late fifteenth century, the estate belonged to the Benedictine monks of Siena. It subsequently passed through several owners, among them the Florentine Niccolini family. Before the end of the modern age, it was sold to the Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence. Records from that period describe an agricultural property producing a varied range of foods, including wine and olive oil.

Nineteenth-century ownership and twentieth-century restoration

During the nineteenth century, Cafaggio became the property of the Boddi family. At the end of the 1860s, the Farkas family acquired it as a country residence.

By 1967, the property had fallen into serious neglect. The Farkas family responded with a substantial agricultural and structural renewal: the cellars were renovated, while the vineyards and olive groves were replanted.

Development of the estate’s vineyard bottlings

Basilica Solatìo was first produced in 1981. Its original run continued through 1995, conceived as an emblematic Chianti Classico Riserva from Cafaggio.

The first vintage of Basilica San Martino followed in 1985. Its name refers to the ancient church of San Martino in Cecione, to which the vineyard had once been attached.

Basilica del Cortaccio was first produced in 1989 from the estate’s Cabernet Sauvignon vineyard. In the early 1990s, Sangiovese was planted in the Solatìo vineyard, one of the estate’s most sun-exposed positions in the Conca d’Oro.

La-Vis management and the return of Solatìo

La-Vis Group managed Villa Cafaggio from 2005 through 2015. During this period, Basilica Solatìo returned with the 2010 vintage after its earlier production run had ended in 1995.

From 2013, the six-label Cafaggio range was presented on the market as the summit of the estate’s production.

ISA ownership and renewed strategy

In 2016, the estate became the property of ISA S.p.A., the Trento-based Istituto Atesino di Sviluppo. ISA introduced investment and a development strategy intended to reinforce Cafaggio’s position as a focused Chianti Classico producer while improving the existing estate and its production chain.

At the beginning of this ownership phase, Marco Zanoni was appointed chief executive officer, Fabrizio Veneri became chairman, and Vincenzo Ercolino joined the board as managing director. Ruggero Mazzilli’s agronomic consultancy was renewed while the estate’s biological conversion was being completed. Giuseppe Caviola’s wine consultancy was also renewed; his work included identifying and selecting individual estate parcels to define the hierarchy of the portfolio.

The development plan placed close control of the entire production chain at its centre, from vineyard management through cellar work, with the objective of raising quality and expressing the relationship between each vineyard and its soil. The current team is led by chief executive officer Alessandro Dal Bianco, with Francesco Baldacci responsible for winemaking and production and Alice Santonocito managing vineyard operations.

Recent activity

In September 2025, Cafaggio participated in the thirtieth-anniversary edition of Vino al Vino in Panzano. A retrospective tasting in Piazza Bucciarelli presented historic vintages as a journey through three decades of the estate’s development.

Basilica Cafaggio lies at Località San Martino in Panzano in Chianti, within the commune of Greve in Chianti. The estate occupies a hilly position in the geographic heart of Chianti, between Florence and Siena, and overlooks the Conca d’Oro, or Golden Basin.

The approximately 60 ha property comprises 30 ha of specialised vineyards, around 3 ha of olive groves and a remaining area of woodland. The vineyards occupy exposures ranging from south-east through south to south-west, at documented elevations of approximately 320–365 m above sea level.

Across the principal sites, the soils are predominantly silty-clay loams derived from calcareous geological material. Descriptions include grey and olive-green marly limestone, calcareous sandstone and the Argille scagliose formation. Individual sites differ in depth, stone content, drainage and organic matter: San Martino has deep, stony soil derived from calcareous marl and containing organic matter; Pruneto has deep, lightly stony soil derived from marly limestone and calcareous sandstone; the estate Sangiovese sites are described as clay loams of varying depth, generally well drained and sometimes gravelly.

The named vineyards occupy distinct positions around the basin. Solatìo faces south at 345 m and is among the most sun-exposed parts of the Conca d’Oro. San Martino faces south-east at 365 m. Cortaccio faces south-west at 355 m. Pruneto faces south at approximately 320 m.

The vineyards are cultivated according to organic-farming principles. Agronomic consultant Ruggero Mazzilli develops the estate’s biological vineyard protocol, concentrating on practices that allow the different soils of Panzano in Chianti to retain and express their individual characteristics. The Italian-language footer also identifies an Equalitas certification.

Training systems vary by site and variety. Spurred cordon is used in Solatìo, Cortaccio and Pruneto and is also present in the broader estate Sangiovese vineyards; Guyot is used at San Martino and in parts of the estate Sangiovese holdings. Documented densities range from 5,400 vines/ha in Solatìo to 7,200 vines/ha in San Martino and Cortaccio.

Harvesting is manual across the documented production. Timing follows variety and site: late September for earlier-ripening components, late September through early October for estate Sangiovese, early October for Solatìo and San Martino, and mid-October for Cortaccio Cabernet Sauvignon.

The vineyard programme is intended to respect the identities of the cultivated varieties while distinguishing parcels through their vineyard–soil relationship. Vineyard operations are currently managed by Alice Santonocito.

The cellar includes dedicated winemaking spaces, an ageing cellar divided into a traditional large-cask area (bottaia) and barrique cellar (barricaia), and an estate bottling line.

Harvested grapes are destemmed and gently crushed to limit damage to the skins. Alcoholic fermentation takes place at controlled temperatures, principally in stainless-steel tanks. Cap management includes pump-overs with air; selected lots also receive manual punch-downs. Longer-aged selections can undergo extended post-alcoholic maceration with submerged caps. Malolactic fermentation is spontaneous in several documented processes and may occur either after fermentation or in barrel.

The estate uses several maturation formats according to parcel and intended style. These include 65 hl and medium-sized Slavonian oak casks, 225-litre French oak barriques and glass-lined cement vats. Documented French cooperage includes Sylvain and Taransaud, while Cortaccio also uses oak from Tronçais and Allier. Barriques are generally medium toasted; some programmes use second- and third-use barrels, while others use barrels that have previously held one wine.

Maturation periods represented across the estate include 12–30 months in oak, sometimes followed by 12 months in glass-lined cement. Bottle ageing before release ranges from three to twelve months. Certain blends are assembled before a further period in glass-lined cement. Across the production, cellar choices are adapted to the identity of the vineyard, soil and variety rather than applied as a single uniform recipe.