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1.5 Liter
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Gaja Pieve Santa Restituta Brunello Sugarille 2004
Varietal: Sangiovese (Grosso)
Region: Toscana
By virtue of its distinguished terroir, Sugarille is the more demonstrative of the two Santa Restituta wines, signifying its potency on a visual level in its dark coloring. This mode continues on the dense palate, which characteristically exhibits dark fruit, spices, chocolate, tar, smoke, and toasted oak. Upon release, it normally requires a minimum of four to five years of cellaring before it provides rewarding drinking. It will continue to develop greater complexity and nuance will be exhibited over its maturation, which typically transpires over a 20-year period.
About the Producer
Times were tough in Piemonte in the early ’90s, as the area had been challenged by a succession of less-than-stellar vintages (prior, of course, to the six-year streak that ran from ’95 to ’01). It started Gaja thinking about terroirs outside Piemonte, particularly as he was regularly courted by admirers seeking his involvement in joint ventures. But Gaja wasn’t going to sign onto something that won cachet solely through his presence. Having galvanized Piemonte with modern techniques and illegitimate grapes, Gaja was looking for some established ground to grow on. Toscana’s Montalcino zone held the allure he was looking for, as well as what he considered a profound connection to Piemonte’s wine culture. Most significantly, an estate by the name of Pieve Santa Restituta needed someone just like him….
This was the opinion, at any rate, of Roberto Bellini, who had purchased the historic property in 1972 with his wife, Franca. Although they invested in new vineyards and cultivated those in existence, receiving favorable acknowledgments, they believed that the full potential of the land could be realized only with the involvement of a formidable talent. There was certainly some substantive history to honor here. A group of Christians fleeing persecution had established the property in the 4th century, erecting a church— Pieve di Santa Restituta—in honor of the eponymous martyr, Santa Restituta. Documents establish that wine (specifically, red) had been produced on estate grounds as early as the 12th century.
Upon Gaja’s formally entering into partnership with Bellini in 1994, the estate’s former name was reinstated (the Bellinis had changed it to Chiesa di Santa Restituta) in order to reflect the historical significance of the property. To a certain degree, it also signified the forthcoming transfer of creative control. Although Bellini attended to the ’04 vintage, he didn’t stick around much longer after that. Gaja assumed full creative control the very vintage thereafter, retaining the estate’s focus on two bottlings exclusively, the multisite Brunello Rennina and the single-vineyard Brunello Sugarille. The latter is regarded as the more structured of the two bottlings, given the site’s propitious positioning, soil composition (calcareous clay), and southern exposure. Both receive one year of aging in barrique followed by an equivalent period in large oak casks. Thereafter, they are refined in bottle for a period of two years prior to release. |
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