IS A GENERATIONAL CHANGE ENOUGH TO EXPLAIN THE DECLINE IN INTEREST IN INVESTMENT WINES? WITH THE END OF THE SPECULATIVE BUBBLE, IS IT NECESSARY TO GO BACK TO DRINKING FINE WINES?
Hedonism London cult store for fine wines
By Donatella Cinelli Colombini, winedestination, Fattoria del Colle Trequanda, Casato Prime Donne Montalcino
Fine wines are investment wines, managed like stocks, diamonds, or stamps. They’re wines that aren’t drunk but rather stored in safes to be resold at a higher price. This market is currently experiencing significant difficulties, especially for French wines, which traditionally dominate the market.
The Drinks Business interviewed some of the leading experts in this sector, first and foremost Liv-ex, a British portal similar to Nasdaq. The latter provides real-time charts, technical analysis, components, and quotes for stocks, while Liv.ex does the same for fine wines. I quote Max Lalondrelle’s exact words: “There’s something fundamentally wrong with the way we sell fine wines right now.”
What is this mistake? Those who buy a wine on reservation and then see it arrive on the market at a lower price get angry and realize that paying in advance isn’t worth it. This is why the speculative system has broken down and investments have fallen.
THE ANSWER IS YES, BUT THEY ARE NOT ENOUGH IN AN ERA WHERE CONSUMERS SEEK IN WINE, AS IN EVERYTHING THEY BUY, A REPRESENTATION OF THEMSELVES AND THEIR VALUES.
Kostantin Baum MW wine scores
By Donatella Cinelli Colombini, winedestination, Fattoria del Colle Trequanda, Casato Prime Donne Montalcino
Today, critics are no longer the only ones who pass judgment on wines; there are sommeliers, wine educators, influencers, retailers, algorithms, and ordinary consumers who post their opinions on portals. Furthermore, many consumers, especially young ones, prioritize values such as sustainability, authenticity, and wine’s ability to narrate a story rather than “quality.” This is an abstract concept that perhaps less closely aligns with their need to represent themselves through what they eat, what they wear, or the style of their place of residence.
For this reason, “the authority once placed in a single score appears increasingly unstable,” writes Konstantin Baum, Germany’s youngest Master of Wine. The notes below are largely taken from his WineSearcher article, which I encourage you to read.
EXCELLENT SCORES FOR DONATELLA CINELLI COLOMBINI’S NEW BRUNELLOS, WHICH EARN TWO 94/100 AND ONE 93/100, CONFIRMING THE APPRECIATION OF INTERNATIONAL CRITICS
Brunello 2021, Brunello Riserva 2020, Brunello Prime Donne 2021 Wine Spectator Rtings
Wine Spectator is the most widely read and followed magazine among collectors and high-spending wine lovers around the world. Achieving a good score in this magazine means gaining entry to the top restaurants and wine shops. Achieving this every year, as happens with Donatella Cinelli Colombini‘s wines, is a sign of consistent quality that only the best wineries can achieve.
The critic tasting the Brunello and other Tuscan wines is Bruce Sanderson, senior editor of Wine Spectator, who has directed the magazine’s tastings for years.
Want to receive 2 oil tasting gift boxes, plus 6 100ml cans of traditional oil and 2 bottles of Brut Rosé Spumante for €169.50?
Extra virgin olive oil tasting box (3.3 oz tins) and Brut Rosé Metodo Classico 2020 sparkling wine – Donatella Cinelli Colombini, Tuscany
Moraiolo, elegant and delicate. It pairs perfectly with both raw and cooked vegetables, fish, and fresh stretched-curd cheeses, such as mozzarella.
Correggiolo, intense and structured. Its intensity calls for equally bold flavours, such as legume soups, grilled or stewed red meats, game, and mushrooms.
Traditional mixed, harmonious and balanced. Ideal with vegetable soups, bruschetta, crostini, and red meats.
These cans can be thought of as small gifts for friends, but also as place cards for an important dinner. Or you can take them with you on a picnic dedicated to nature and natural things.
Also perfect to be served at the picnic is our Spumante Metodo Classico Brut Rosé
91, 93, 93, and 94/100 FOR THE 2019 CENERENTOLA ORCIA DOC FROM FOUR SUPER CANADIAN TASTERS WHO ARE IN LOVE WITH THIS WINE’S DIVERSITY AND LENGTH
Orcia Doc 2019 Cenerentola Donatella Cinelli Colombini
By Donatella Cinelli Colombini, winedestination, Fattoria del Colle Trequanda, Casato Prime Donne Montalcino
The most cautious opinion comes from Michael Godel, a great connoisseur of Brunello and Tuscan winemaking in general, who tasted the 2019 Orcia Doc Cenerentola in November 2024 when it was “better to continue waiting” as he himself wrote.
The other tastings were conducted in March 2026, and the score rises to 93-94 points. David Lawrason has words of high praise: “The nose is extraordinary, very expressive, with complexity from maturation and a mix of red and black fruits… It’s full-bodied, with pronounced acidity and a notable warmth from the 15% alcohol. The tannins are quite firm and drying, but not green. The length is excellent, verging on exceptional.”
Wow, what a beautiful comment.
Sara d’Amato—an ecologist, writer, and highly experienced sommelier—also delivers a thrilling description. “The result is elegant and generous, both in aromas and on the palate. The oak is expertly integrated, allowing fruit and spice to unfold harmoniously. The tannins are ripe and enveloping, in line with the growing sensation of warmth provided by the 15% alcohol in the finish, which offers excellent length.”
The 94/100 rating comes from John Szabo, Canada’s first Master Sommelier and author of the book Volcanic Wines, which helped the world rediscover the uniqueness and charm of wines born near smoking mountains.
Regarding Cenerentola, he writes, “2019 is a spectacular vintage, and the wine’s class emerges here with an almost perfect balance, now beautifully harmonized.”
He also notes the “excellent length” of the Orca DOC Cenerentola, a character that seems to have impressed all tasters.
“TRY TO MAKE OTHERS HAPPY.” FOR EASTER LET’S JOIN ROBERTO BENIGNI IN URGING EVERYONE TO BE HAPPY AND TO GIVE HAPPINESS.
Montalcino- Sant’Antimo
In 2014, Roberto Benigni was the protagonist of a RAI program entitled Ten Commandments. One of his most famous speeches is the one on happiness, broadcast on December 1st.
The central line is this: “Make others happy. I said ‘happy’, not ‘better’. Don’t try to make others better. There’s only one person you should try to make better: yourself. You have to make others happy, and to make someone happy, you have to be happy yourself! Be happy, be happy, and become the adult you wish you had by your side when you were a child.”
According to Roberto Benigni, happiness is a gift and an achievement. All men and women are born happy, but if they don’t work on themselves to be better, they lose their happiness and, with it, the ability to make others happy.
A statement so simple it seems banal, but it’s actually profound and particularly connected to Easter. Even those who don’t believe in Jesus as the Son of God must recognize that accepting torture and death for the love of others is something enormous.
“Love one another as I have loved you,” says Jesus, and it’s the same phrase that Benigni uses: “Make others happy.” The verb is different, but the meaning is the same, because love given generously makes those around us happy.
10 VINTAGES OF ORCIA DOC CENERENTOLA TOGETHER WITH FASHION, DESIGN, EVENTS, SONGS AND FILMS FROM THE SAME YEARS TO DISCOVER HOW WINE IS CULTURE AND A MIRROR OF HUMANITY
Donatella Cinelli Colombini and her daughter Violante transformed the presentation of the 2020 Orcia DOC Riserva Cenerentola into a true workshop centred on the concept of “wine is culture.” A new and stimulating experience that engaged 60 guests, including journalists and industry professionals.
We’ll try to understand if wine changes its interpretation of the vineyard like a great piece of music. To illustrate the concept with an example, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 has a different character whether the orchestra is conducted by Toscanini, von Karajan, or Muti. The score is the same, just as the grapes and terroir are the same, but the final result changes based on an interpretation of the historical moment.
On Monday, March 23, at the Fattoria del Colle di Trequanda, for the first time, the wine will be tasted alongside the civilization in which it was born, an experience that will likely open new horizons for wine storytelling.
The tasting includes 10 vintages: 2001, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2013, 2016, 2017, 2018 of Orcia DOC Cenerentola, and the new 2020 Riserva, under the impeccable guidance of Ilaria Lorini, the first woman to be crowned Best Italian Sommelier (AIS) in 2025. From the first Italian wineries with an all-female staff, one could not expect anything different.
MY MEETINGS WITH FEDERICO FELLINI AND THE CHARM OF AN EXTRAORDINARY MAN WHO LOOKED ORDINARY WHO TRANSFORMED ORDINARY THINGS IN EXTRAORDINARY WAYS
Federico Fellini with
his wife and the Guidotti and Cinelli Colombini families
by Donatella Cinelli Colombini, winedestination, Casato Prime Donne Montalcino, Fattoria del Colle Trequanda
I’m talking about events that occurred about fifty years ago. Federico Fellini often came to my mother’s winery in Montalcino, thanks to our mutual friendship with Mario Guidotti, a journalist and cultural promoter. After the first, more formal visits, Italy’s greatest director began arriving unannounced, like a member of the family.
The problem was that, often, my parents were away, and I had to welcome Fellini alone. I was very young and lived a very bourgeois and decidedly provincial existence between Montalcino and Siena. I was used to meeting intellectuals and famous people because my family had always had that kind of association, but Federico Fellini was decidedly in another league.
That man was a legend, a world-renowned genius with five Academy Awards. His fame was so immense that it would have intimidated people far more skilled than me. I was incredibly nervous in front of him, my hands were sweating, I couldn’t sit still, and above all, I could only say a few polite words, but I didn’t know how to communicate with him; I felt like I had nothing interesting to say. What a shame!
Federico Fellini and his wife Giulietta Masina would come to Tuscany for the beneficial “waters” in Chianciano. From there, they travelled to Montalcino to break the monotony of the treatments and perhaps even indulge a bit. They were often accompanied by Mario Guidotti or the then-very young Fabio Carlesi.
WHAT FOLLOWS IS THE STORY OF HOW THE FINANCING FOR THE TWO NEW AMBULANCES OF THE MISERICORDIA DI SINALUNGA WAS REACHED. IT’S NOT A MIRACLE, BUT NEARLY
By Donatella Cinelli Colombini
Carlo Gardini’s second ambulance blessing in Fattoria del Colle
It all began while my husband Carlo was in the hospital after falling down the stairs and undergoing an operation that left him almost immobile in bed, experiencing a real ordeal.
During that sad time, I met Stefania Magnani, president of the Misericordia di Sinalunga, so as to volunteer. She directed me to two activities: preparing food parcels and raising funds to finance the purchase of two ambulances. At the time, the Misericordia needed to replace two ambulances that had already travelled more than 250,000 kilometres and they had only €10,000 in cash. The president was extremely worried and was considering buying two used ambulances to keep them going for a few years.
FROM TOURISM SHOPPING BASED ON AUTHENTIC, IDENTITY-ORIENTED, AND EXCLUSIVE PRODUCTS TO THE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL STRENGTHENING OF TERRITORIES. THIS IS NON-CANNIBAL TOURISM.
Famous street food in Naples – pizza margherita. Authenticity at its best!
By Donatella Cinelli Colombini, winedestination, Casato Prime Donne Montalcino, Fattoria del Colle Trequanda
When I first went to the UK, I bought a kilt that I wore for years. I was 17, and in Italy, especially in Siena, it wasn’t possible to buy anything similar. There were pleated skirts with tartan patterns, but not in the same wool and not with such beautiful designs.
Over the next 50 years, the industrial production of clothing, food, and originally handcrafted objects, as well as globalization, led to a progressive diffusion of “ethnic products” in world markets. Kilts could also be purchased in Tuscany and later online, at prices much cheaper than my first tartan skirt. But the quality was no longer the same, nor was the charm of an authentic object purchased in the production area.
Once upon a time, the greatest appeal of travel was the possibility of immersing oneself in a reality different from one’s own, where the sights, lifestyle, sounds, flavours, and smells allowed one to discover a civilization whose artistic monuments were the jewels of its crown.
WHERE DO STAR WINE PRODUCERS AND LARGE WINERIES COME FROM? PERSONAL TALENT, INNOVATION, VISION OF FUTURE MARKET TRENDS, OR WHAT?
What transforms a grape grower into a great wine producer, Alessandro Mori Il Marroneto
By Donatella Cinelli Colombini, winedestination, Casato Prime Donne Montalcino, Fattoria del Colle Trequanda
In Montalcino, as in Barolo, there are many wine producers born into farming families who have become international winemaking stars. I’ve always wondered whether this growth was the result of production spurred by innovation or commercial insight… or whether it arose from the ability to interpret the gifts of the land like a sculptor does with marble.
How does the transformation from grape grower to successful entrepreneur happen?
Obviously, the great winemakers—and I’m thinking of people like Bepi Quintarelli, Alessandro Mori from Il Marroneto, or Elena Fucci—raise attention to their territory with their splendid wines, setting an example and opening the market to other producers as well.
Their success seems to be tied to their personal talent and their ability to make it visible.
Then there are the successful producers who transform from grape growers into great entrepreneurs, and this is what I’d like to focus on.
In books, the transformation from artisan to entrepreneur is described as the shift from making things to managing production and planning long-term strategies, “from working in the lab to working on the lab.” Translating this concept to wine, we could say that a wine producer becomes an entrepreneur when he stops thinking only about the vineyard and begins to think in terms of project, market, and value.
ROBERT PARKER – WINE ADVOCATE PUBLISHES REVIEWS OF THE 2021 BRUNELLO AND 2020 RISERVA JUST RELEASED, WITH WONDERFUL DESCRIPTIONS BY MONICA LARNER
By Donatella Cinelli Colombini, winedestination, Casato Prime Donne Montalcino, Fattoria del Colle Trequanda
Brunello Prime Donne 2021, Brunello di Montalcino 2021 e Brunello Riserva 2020 Donatella Cinelli Colombini wine advocate ratings Casato Prime Donne, Montalcino, Toscana
As always, Monica Larner, editor of the Robert Parker- Wine Advocate, impresses with her above-average journalistic professionalism. She’s not just a taster, as many of her colleagues are; she’s above all a journalist capable of narrating wine regions and explaining their evolution over time. Reading her helps us understand the appellations, of which she is one of the most faithful and profound narrators. This professional trait derives from her education at Boston University and then New York University, as well as from her experience in the editorial offices of three major newspapers: La Repubblica, the International Herald Tribune, and Corriere della Sera.
A more than solid background which, in more recent years, has been combined with an excellent tasting ability that places Monica Larner among the best wine critics in the world.
Sangiovese for the 2021 harvest Toscana Montalcino Casato Prime Donne
The Ardita vineyard is one of Montalcino‘s finest. Every year, in any climate, it produces perfect grapes with small clusters and berries and uniform ripening.
It was planted in 2002 at 225 meters above sea level in a Plio-Quaternary soil with a prevalence of clay and marine sand. It had a slow start and is still not very vigorous; in fact, it almost never requires green harvesting because it spontaneously produces about a kilo of grapes per plant.
Like all the world’s great vineyards, the Ardita vineyard requires very little attention; in other words, it “does everything itself” thanks to a particular terroir. Even in the cellar, the wine produced from the Ardita vineyard requires no human intervention because it is flawless; therefore, it simply needs to be carefully stored in the finest quality barrels.
For this reason, the tasters who choose Brunello Prime Donne through blind tastings of the estate’s entire production often prefer the powerful, velvety structure of the wine from the Ardita vineyard. In the past, they requested it be aged in barrels (15-20 hl), but now they are also fascinated by the character of 5-7 hectoliter tonneaux, especially when steam-bent.
The 2021 harvest will be remembered as the longest and most expensive because the grapes were selected bunch by bunch in the vineyards. Due to an Arctic current that swept across Europe at the end of April, a large portion of the buds were scorched by the frost, while those that were still closed opened late, several days later. The vines’ growing cycles therefore began at different times, and the grapes therefore ripened at different times.
The bunches and berries were small and beautiful. But to pick them at the perfect moment of ripeness, the harvesters had to select them by hand, moving from one vineyard to another. It was a huge undertaking.
The very long ripening phase of this vintage created the foundation for the wines with excellent structure and with a particular vocation for long aging.
