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Kellerei Kaltern
KALTERN IS..
… a cooperative winery located on Lake Kaltern in the Italian province of Alto Adige. Embodying a combination of Alpine and Mediterranean influences, our wines stand for carefree enjoyment and the relaxed feeling of life on Lake Kaltern. Their mission is simply to give people pleasure. We see ourselves as ambassadors for Kaltern, its winegrowers and the wines produced on the shore of Lake Kaltern, especially the variety known as Schiava (Kalterersee) – wines that are made by a community of vintners with great sensitivity, passion and expertise, wines that offer finesse and complexity and yet remain wonderfully uncomplicated.
HISTORY
The history of the Kaltern winery goes back a long way. It took more than a century for our winery to become what it is today and what it stands for today: professionalism, passion, family community, experience and the highest quality standards.
Today the Kaltern winery is one of the most important wineries in South Tyrol , and Kaltern itself is proud of its reputation as the most popular and well-known wine village in the region. But Kaltern is not only a special place for wine lovers and connoisseurs from near and far. The whole village lives with and from wine. The wine directs here every day, gives and does work, fulfills residents and winemakerswith pride and for many is a life’s work that they pursue with great passion – be it in the vineyard, in the cellar, in gastronomy or in retail.
In Kaltern, wine primarily stands for enjoyment and quality. What makes the small community on South Tyrol’s largest natural swimming lake and its wine so unique is the community that stands behind it. The spirit, the euphoria, the common striving to carry the wine, the village and of course the “natural beauty of Kaltern” out into the world. The Kaltern winery plays an important role in this and relies on what defines it: consistent quality with combined forces.
1900 To Today: The Kellerei Kaltern Writes History
The history of the Kaltern winery begins at the beginning of the 20th century. A century that tells the eventful history of the five wineries of Kaltern, in addition to long, grueling war years and the separation of South Tyrol from Austria – of glorious times as purveyors to the imperial and royal court, of economic crises and upswing, of mergers and a consistent focus on quality in viticulture. In the 21st century, a cellar cooperative emerged from this with 650 members and 450 hectares of vineyards.
1900 : Establishment of the Kaltern winery cooperative
1906 : Establishment of the Kaltern farmer’s winery
1908: Foundation of the Kaltern jubilee winery
1925: Founding of the New Kaltern Cellar; the Kaltern winery cooperative now operates under the name “Erste Kellereigenossenschaft Kaltern”
1932: The Baron Di Pauli private winery becomes the Josef Baron Di Pauli cooperative
1986: The first cellar cooperative in Kaltern and the new cellar cooperative merge; this becomes the “Erste + Neue Kellereigenossenschaft Kaltern”
1991: The Josef Baron Di Pauli cooperative is incorporated into Erste + Neue Kellerei; the Tenuta Baron Di Pauli becomes an independent winery again.
1992: The farmer’s winery and the anniversary winery merge to form the Kaltern winery
2016: Erste + Neue Kellerei and Kellerei Kaltern merge to form Cantina Kaltern
COOPERATIVE
Our cooperative is a big family. It has 650 members or winemakers , most of whom own less than one hectare of land – an average of 0.7 hectares (the size of a soccer field). They are passionate winegrowers and mostly earn their living in other professions. They look after their historically grown farms and vineyards with great passion. Kaltern owes a piece of its picturesque beauty to them.
We are united by our love for wine, Kaltern and our lake. Together we stand for the preservation of our cultural landscape and produce quality wines that we are proud of. We define viticulture as a community craft that is consistently professional. The cooperative holds the many small family winemaking structures together, guarantees quality and security and gives its members the opportunity to participate in something big.
In our family, quality-obsessed lateral thinkers, biodynamic revolutionaries and tradition-conscious heads of families pull together. It is our declared goal to produce wines of the highest quality that represent our homeland. The commitment and ambition of our members forms the basis for the success of our Kaltern winery.
The strength of our cooperative is togetherness. Due to the family business structure and the small parceling of our vineyards, we are very flexible and can mobilize ad hoc workers if necessary. Our agronomists and cellar masters stand by the winemakers all year round as service providers, consultants and partners: They offer further education and training, define individual production goals, undertake inspections and maintain regular exchanges with one another.
Working together and living together – the harvest time is an example of this. In autumn, all family members, whether young or old, come to the grape harvest (also called Wimmen), move from vine to vine and from row to row together to harvest every single grape by hand. And at the end of the day, people traditionally eat, laugh and toast the work done together.
There is a special attitude towards life at Lake Kaltern , shaped by the family spirit, by the common work, the efforts and the successes. You can taste all of this when you enjoy our wines.
VINEYARDS
Striving for quality, sustainability, biodynamics
For us at the Kaltern winery, it is not only a pleasure to cultivate and maintain the uniquely beautiful wine-growing region around Lake Caldaro that has grown over the centuries, but also an obligation. We want to actively contribute to preserving the natural and cultural landscape that surrounds us. We want to protect and strengthen the diverse soils and the entire ecosystem – and last but not least, we want to produce great quality wines. With honest craftsmanship and always in harmony with nature.
From pruning to harvest
The work in the vineyard involves many tasks over the course of the year: From pruning to harvest, it is important to coordinate and train the 650 members and to fully exploit synergies. In addition, at the beginning of the wine year, we set individual yield targets for each of the more than 2,000 parcels, which are then checked and evaluated by the winery’s agronomist using a close-knit system. The grape quality is an indispensable basic value for us, which must be guaranteed by all winemakers. Our members know exactly which grapes are intended for which wines. They work with the greatest respect for their own land, care for their vineyards with devotion and enjoy the annual result: the fantastic wines from Kaltern.
“The nice thing about working in the vineyard is the sense of community and the passion with which everyone makes their contribution. Our large family can take on all the imponderables and climatic capers. We stick together and support each other wherever there is a need. Our strength lies in the spontaneous mobilization of manpower. This is how we secure production targets and quality standards. ”Hannes Rohrgger, winegrowing manager at the Kaltern winery
St. Nikolaus, St. Josef, Planitzing …
Among our 1,100 vineyards are very special locations: historically grown, predestined for certain varieties and outstanding wines. Locations that we work sustainably, partly organic or biodynamic and consistently quality-oriented. When it comes to biodynamic viticulture , the Kaltern winery plays a pioneering role in all of South Tyrol. A group of members and sensitive thought leaders are already cultivating more than 15 hectares of vineyards according to this special form of organic viticulture and doing great pioneering work. These grapes are also processed in the cellar according to Rudolf Steiner’s teachings. In principle, all of our winegrowers avoid the use of herbicides.
SUSTAINABILITY
Since the 2018 vintage, the Kaltern winery has been the first wine producer in Italy and the first cooperative to be awarded the FAIR’N GREEN sustainability certification. We are in good company with well-known wineries such as Clemens Busch, St. Urbanshof, Künstler, Philipp Kuhn, Meyer-Näkel, Heymann Löwenstein and Dönhoff.
FAIR’N GREEN is THE seal for sustainable viticulture. It supports wineries and winemakers in making sustainability goals objectively measurable and verifiable and in achieving them in an integrative way. The areas of operational management, the environment, society and the value chain are considered. The FAIR’N GREEN standard for sustainable viticulture stipulates that every winery establishes processes in order to continuously improve its entire management, work in the vineyard, cellar management and marketing within the framework of holistic sustainability analysis. We are continuously advised and follow the development plan drawn up for us as part of the certification. In addition, further analyzes (e.g. life cycle assessment, CO2 footprint) are carried out.
FAIR’N GREEN wineries must meet high minimum requirements in order to be allowed to use the seal and then improve each year in a binding manner. Independent institutes ensure the correctness of the certification according to scientific requirements.
The most important goals of FAIR’N GREEN are environmental protection and natural viticulture as well as the promotion of biodiversity and the protection of natural resources. In addition, fair wages and social commitment are to be ensured and social responsibility is to be demanded. Ultimately, the preservation and promotion of the cultural landscape is also a major concern. Wine lovers can not only enjoy excellent wines, but also those that have been produced under responsible conditions for people and nature.
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