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Piera 1899
PIERA 1899
The Piera Martellozzo winery was founded in 1899 in Camposampiero, near the town of Padova, by Piera’s grandfather, Giovanni.
He started a small wine production, however well distributed in the local market. Giovanni Martellozzo was succeeded by Piera’s father, Mario.
During the ’70, he was able to expand the company both in Italy and in some foreign countries.
A rock-solid name, an instinct you can depend on: it was 1992 when Piera Martellozzo was tasked by her father with managing the family’s small wine estate, then situated in Padua province. Over two decades, after transferring its estate to Friuli and following a period of consolidation, the firm became a benchmark in the north-east Italian wine sector. Friuli Venezia Giulia, the eastern Veneto and Trentino: complex, variegated soils whose common denominator is their ability to produce fine wines, combined with thousands of years of history whose legacy is still alive and tangible in the area’s manor houses, historic villages and many art towns.
“Mapping places, identifying the most promising plots, extracting must which expresses all the grapes’ magnificence to create sparkling and stylish wines which are a pleasure for the taste buds, the hands and the eyes. We are privileged to be able to devote ourselves body and soul to a trade which is, first and foremost, a story with deep roots and a self-conscious choice renewed every day.”
INTERPRETERS OF OUR TIME
Beginning in 1899, at the Padua estate, Piera’s story has been passed down through the family from generation to generation, from father to daughter, unusual people taking turns to break through new frontiers, time and again. Founded by her grandfather Giovanni, developed by her father Mario, Piera 1899 owes its reputation both in Italy and abroad to Piera Martellozzo who has given her name and, for over twenty-five years, her leadership to it with determination and gentleness.
Suffused with her pioneering, ahead- of-her-times spirit, the firm conquered its primary role in the Italian wine scenario with talent, frequently anticipating trends and seeking out its own path to quality, beyond fashion. Since the 1990s thoroughgoing reassessment work on then little known native vines was done with varieties such as Raboso del Piave and Ribolla Gialla. In 1998 the first organic wine range was brought out. Since the noughties an ever growing Prosecco production has been supplemented by new sparkling wines such as Müller-Thurgau and Moscato Giallo. In recent years Piera 1899 has consolidated its roots and become a benchmark in Italy and overseas.
LAND DISCOVERIES
Attention to the land and its cycles and fruits began with a study of the area and its production choices, a task which came to fruition in the wine cellars and translated into care and attention to every single phase.
The recognised quality of Piera 1899 wines is the result of everyday hard work founded on respect for the land and its traditions nurtured by an innate propensity for innovation. It is a commitment that takes the form of maximum process and winemaking choice sustainability aimed at the minimum environmental impact.
Professionalism, responsibility and openness to the new: are the values that inspire Piera Martellozzo. Expanding her working group, she has built a cohesive team of trained professionals with whom she shares her drive for quality and respect for the environment she works in.
THE PRIVILEGE OF CHOICE
Situated in San Quirino in the Pordenone area, in the northeast of Italy, Piera 1899 chose the Friuli Grave as its ideal territory. Featuring large stony areas of alluvial origin, the “Grave” area extends between the province of Pordenone and that of Udine, covering a surface area of about 7,500 hectares, straddling the river Tagliamento. Here the natural landscape stands out for its marked originality, a high plain close to the Alps, formed thousands of years ago by the flooding of the rivers Meduna, Cellina and Tagliamento. Dragged by the powerful water, enormous amounts of calcareous-dolomitic material were deposited downstream over the centuries, along the riverbeds, leaving a coarser trail of material in the northern part, which gradually became finer towards the sea to create the so-called “Magredi” lands.
These stony lands, unfold from the gravelly riverbeds towards dry meadows, very similar to the steppe grasslands of Eastern Europe. They have created a unique landscape in Italy due to its special microclimate and the porous composition of the soil, where the water disappears among the pebbles and resurfaces further downstream in the resurgent spring area. In these lands, vines have found their ideal habitat, since the stony expanses of vineyards absorb the heat of the sun, increasing the temperature range between day and night.
The important temperature range of this terroir encourages the ideal concentration of aromatic substances in the grape skins and therefore the most intense and elegant aromas, as well as the presence of natural acids in the flesh, essential for the good preservation of wine. The climate is influenced by the mountains to the north, which protect the territory from the coldest winds, whereas the Adriatic Sea to the south has a mitigating effect, contributing to a microclimate particularly suited to vine growing. Hot but not too much humid summers alternate with cold and moderately rainy winters.
The amount of rainfall gradually increases from the lower plain towards the western foothills of the territory: from the coastal strip, with less rainfall, to the foothills of the Alps, with heavier rainfall. In these lands, dedicated to viticulture, a tradition since Roman times, different crops grown in succession have left important historical and artistic evidence to complement nature and its amazing beauty. This legacy of art, history and landscape has forged the widespread culture of respecting the land and its fruits. These places steeped in knowledge, beauty and traditions originating among Venetian villas and traces of the ancient Venetian Republic, have led to a wealth of knowledge that Piera 1899 has chosen to capture and decant in every glass of its wine.
PIERA 1899
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