To understand why this wine is so different from our other vintages, with its flamboyant fruit and powerful aromas, it's important to go back in time and consider the fatigue, almost starvation, the vineyards had endured throughout the previous year, 2007, which had been dry and rainless since winter. Hungry and without reserves, the vines entered 2008 and faced its main conditions: a rainy spring, with sudden cold spells; and a long, blinding summer, with the terrible Val d'Orcia sun at its core.

When the vineyard first developed its foliage, it immediately exhibited an exaggerated fertility, reflected in the unusually fixed green of its leaves. It seemed to be able to protect itself from the heat throughout the month of August, and I thought the vines had escaped the stress; instead, they gave in much later, secretly stalling after the first week of September and remaining dormant for the entire month. The grapes, due to the cold spring, had formed unevenly and were poorly protected behind small leaves, some exposed to direct sunlight.

At the end of September, when the Merlot harvest usually begins in Trinoro, I couldn't find a single ripe berry, no matter how much I wandered among the vines. But, invisible within the grapes, lay the seeds of the very different flavors that this year's wine would have. After a few small "tasting" harvests, I therefore suspended the harvest: a nightmare for every winemaker where the grapes don't ripen, while November and the rains arrive quickly. Ripeness suddenly made itself felt here and there among the Merlots, in mid-October: I began harvesting a whole host of small sections and parcels of the vineyard, until, in the end, across all grape varieties, we filled about forty vats. The musts had very different hues and aromas. The wines, as they appeared after a few months, seemed like a mosaic of aromas that reminded me of childhood, colorful things. Now that I assemble them, the 2008 vintage, so difficult and time-consuming to understand, grasp, and vinify, transforms into an exotic and powerful wine, with qualities different, I think, from other Tenuta di Trinoro vintages.

Vineyard age: 10-15 years

Plant density: 10,000 vines per hectare

Altitude: 450-600 m above sea level

Yield per hectare: 21 quintals per hectare

Fertilization: None

Treatments: Clay, propolis, grapefruit seed extract

Vinification: Alcoholic fermentation for 12-16 days in 40 hl stainless steel tanks

Aging: Malolactic fermentation and aging for 6 months in new French oak barriques, then racked into concrete tanks

Production: 9,600 bottles

REVIEWS
“The 2008 Tenuta di Trinoro sweeps across the palate with layers of beautifully articulated fruit, violets, spices, and minerals, while avoiding the heaviness and overripeness that characterized some of the wines of the past. The tannins and the oak both need several years to fully harmonize, but this is a soft, impeccably refined Tenuta to treasure over the next two decades, perhaps longer. (Drink 2014 – 2028)”

— Antonio Galloni, 96+ points

Gambero Rosso, Three Glasses