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Issue 734 - May 19th - 23rd 2025 - Expressly created for 3707 wine lovers,
professionals and opinion leaders from all over the world | |
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| | | A vineyard in Oltrepò Pavese, the most important Pinot Noir-producing area in Italy and a reference point for Metodo Classico sparkling wine, with the trees on the road acting as a frame, emphasizing its natural and man-made beauty: this is “Window in the Vineyard”, a shot by Alessandro Anglisani, the only Italian winner of the “Errazuriz Wine Photographer of the Year” (category “Places”), an award of the “World Food Photography Awards” 2025. Overall winner, the photo “Pinot Noir at Midnight” by Heather Daenitz (and in the “People” category), and, for the “Produce” category, “The Hand in the Vat” by Franck Tremblay. | |
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| | The wine market is increasingly difficult to interpret. Even in the numbers. And looking at the United States, which plays a very prominent role in the economic fortunes of the sector, and obviously in the spotlight more than ever because of the duties issue, remarkable contradictions emerge. Because if those who monitor final consumption have been talking about a major decline for some time, as recorded for example by SipSource data or by the Unione Italiana Vini - Uiv Observatory (based on Nielsen IQ data), the numbers of exports to the U.S. continue to be positive, as told by Istat data on the first 2 months of the year, but also those on the first quarter of 2025 by the Organización Interprofesional del Vino de España (Oive). According to which wine imports from the United States, in the first three months of the year (so with duties still “only” threatened, since they have been in force to the extent of 10% since the beginning of April, and this will be the case at least until July 9, ed.), grew a good 21.6% in value over the same period 2024, for 1.7 billion euros, and 3.9% in volume, for 328.4 million liters, with an average price per liter of 5.32 euros, up 17%. With an impressive increase by France, which takes the provisional lead in value, with 723.9 million euros, +51% over the first 3 months of 2024, followed by Italy, at 548 million euros between January and March 2025, an increase of +17.1%, according to Oive. Italy confirmed its leadership in volume, with 93.1 million liters (+16.6%), ahead of France itself, with 52.4 million liters (+37.2%). On the podium, by value, in third place is New Zealand, which, however, loses 19.5%, and stops at 124.4 million, while in volume there is Canada (among the first countries in the world involved in the tariff war with the U.S., ed.), with 42.8 million liters, and a drop of -29%. According to Oive data, therefore, the difference in average price between wines from Italy and France is confirmed to be huge: 13.8 euros per liter for transalpine wines, 5.8 euros for those from the Belpaese (still above average). In any case, wine imports to the U.S. are in the positive even looking at the 12 months between March 2024 and March 2025, with a net growth in value (+14.6%), amounting to 6.5 billion euros, against a substantial stability in volume (+0.9%) at 1.2 billion liters.
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| | The Observatory of Unione Italiana Vini (Uiv) notes that the “global Italian wine market” is “in sharp contraction in the first quarter of the year. A downward spiral that today is also reflected in export data”. For the UIV, “exports to non-EU countries closed the first quarter with volumes down by almost 9% (-0.1% in value) despite the +4% in the U.S. (which, however, closes March with a slowdown)”. For Unione Italiana Vini president Lamberto Frescobaldi, “in the last six months we have witnessed an apparent paradox: Italian shipments to the United States seemed to be holding up or even growing in some sectors, but the actual consumption data tell a different story. The pre-Thanksgiving rush has deluded the markets but final consumption is declining or at best stagnant”. | |
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| | | The elegance and austerity of Barolo and Barbaresco, the complexity of the bubbles of Alta Langa, the sweetness of those of Asti, the everyday pleasure associated with wines such as Barbera, Dolcetto or Gattinara, the interest aroused by peculiar wines such as Timorasso or Gavi, and more: the Piedmont of wine, with its hills that look north to the Alps and south to the Tyrrhenian Sea of the Ligurian Riviera, with its history that has seen the birth of a united Italy among the vineyards, with Cavour, Einaudi and not only, and with its wines that are combined with an extraordinary gastronomy of which the White Truffle of Alba is the diamond, but which counts many jewels among desserts, cheeses, cured meats and hundreds of typical recipes, is a must-see destination for every self-respecting wine tourist. A value also recognized by the “Region of The Year” 2025 award from the “Wine Travel Awards,” the competition that gathers nominations in different categories from all over the world, voted by the public and then by a jury of international experts, which saw the awards ceremony staged at the “London Wine Fair” in recent days in London. Among the jury’s special mentions were Azienda Agricola San Salvatore 1988, a reference of wine from Campania and the Cilento region founded by Peppe Pagano, and Tenute Salvaterra, one of the most prominent wineries in Valpolicella. | |
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| | | A toast with a great Italian wine, in the beauty of the Palazzo della Gran Guardia, before entering the atmosphere of the art of “bel canto” in one of its world temples, the Arena of Verona. A marriage of excellence that takes shape in the project “Vinitaly, the Opera’s Overture” (in more detail) by Fondazione Arena di Verona and Vinitaly, the most important Italian wine fair in the world, signed by Veronafiere, thus embellishing “the Arena Opera Festival Experience”, a project managed by “Infront Italy” (from July 4 to August 31). | |
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| | The extraordinary life of Juliette Colbert, who left France for Piedmont to marry Carlo Tancredi Falletti di Barolo, for whom she had a love affair, going down in history as the Marchesa Giulia di Barolo. Recounting her story is “Blood of the Langhe. The saga of the Barolo family”, the novel signed by award-winning writer Marina Marazza, set in 19th-century Turin, between the Restoration and the Unification of Italy, where Giulia becomes the first to raise the issue of women’s prisons in Italy, sharing the Langhe, and the beloved family estates where a wine is produced that, thanks to her drive and the new methods imported from France, will become the Italian “wine of kings and the king of wines”: “his majesty” Barolo, whose history is still preserved in the cellars of the Marchesi di Barolo by the Abbona family. | |
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| | In the glass, the complex 2024 vintage and the even more difficult (and scarce) 2023 for the reserve versions, which demonstrated, however, the ancient vocation of the grape variety and the ability of producers and Consortium to manage vineyard and cellar operations. All around, all the beauty and history of San Gimignano, which celebrated its centuries-old link with its Vernaccia, at “Regina Ribelle Vernaccia di San Gimignano Wine Fest”, the Festival organized by the Vernaccia Consortium, led by Irina Strozzi, together with the Municipality (in more detail our best tastings).
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