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The "Genius of Neive," Bruno Giacosa was known as a modern traditionalist. This contradictory phrase nods both to Bruno's making his Barolo and Barbaresco with protocol that his winemaking father and grandfather would recognize — and to Bruno's ingenuity, such as bottling the very first cru expressions in Barbaresco and Barolo. Above all, Bruno believed in power of Piemonte's "old ways," growing grapes with noninterventionist methods, fermenting without temperature control, and aging the wine in large oak vats. However, he wasn't afraid to tinker, shortening his maceration period to about a month, using French rather than Slavonian oak, and giving his wines a lengthier maturation period. Bruno worked to make authentic, age-worthy, and serious Langhe wines, and he was one of the world's greatest winemakers. Bruno, who passed in January 2018, started working at his father's winery when he was 13, but he didn't buy his first plot of land, the Falletto vineyard in Serralunga, until 1982. By that time, he'd been one of Italy's greatest producers for twenty years, and in 1996, he purchased his lands in the famed Barbaresco plots of Asili and Rabajá, growing the Bruno Giacosa estate to about 49 acres. The Bruno Giacosa estate is best known for its rare "Red Label" releases, the estate's Riserva bottlings, but it also crafts a range of other indigenous Italian wines, including Freisa, which it helped rescue from extinction. Today, the Bruna Giacosa estate is helmed by daughter Bruna Giacosa, who is aided by her father's longtime enologist, Dante Scaglione, ensuring that Bruno's legacy, and his wines, live on. |
