Natural Wine – Vecchio Consorzio 1953

Vecchio Consorzio 1953 is a sustainable territorial regeneration project that stems from the desire to restore confidence in the farming industry, transforming grapes grown with respect for the environment, using only indigenous yeasts and valorising the tradition of re-fermentation in the bottle and maceration on the skins

WINERY

The Vecchio Consorzio 1953 is a winery created to carry out a territorial regeneration intervention based on wine, a possible response to the haemorrhage that has led the Piacenza Apennine area to lose almost a third of its vineyard surface over the last twenty years.

Starting with the 2022 harvest, Massimiliano Croci and Pietro Gazzola will purchase grapes produced exclusively in the colli piacentini, paying farmers at a fair price. The only condition required to join the project is to grow the grapes under organic farming. The aim is to create value to avoid abandonment.

With these grapes, among the main varieties grown locally, they produce “vin du négoce”, 6 labels describing the geological richness and biodiversity of Piacenza’s viticulture.

ABOUT US

Massimiliano Croci and Pietro Gazzola have chosen to invest in the new project the competencies gained in over twenty years of work in their family’s wineries, the Croci wine estate in Castell’Arquato (PC), in the Arda Valley, and Pietro Gazzola vini in Travo (PC), in the Trebbia Valley.

Almost of the same age (Croci was born in 1980, Gazzola in 1977), the two worked together for three years within the board of the Consorzio tutela vini Doc Colli Piacentini: it was in that context that the idea to give life to the Vecchio Consorzio 1953 project matured.

THE PIACENZA VITICULTURE

In the 2000s, the Colli piacentini lost almost 2000 hectares under vine out of 6,900. Between 2016 and 2021 in the Val d’Arda and neighbouring smaller valleys alone, 141.5 hectares out of 1,457 were lost, practically 10 per cent. After collecting this data, Massimiliano and Pietro began to imagine a regeneration strategy for the area’s agriculture. Unlike the provinces of Parma, Reggio Emilia and Modena, wine-growing in Piacenza is spread exclusively among the hilly area, the one that rises towards the Apennines: the grapes processed by the Vecchio Consorzio 1953 come from the entire area, an expression of the extraordinary geological diversity, in terms of soil composition, that characterises the colli piacentini

The grape suppliers of the Vecchio Consorzio 1953 are committed to producing quality grapes from organic farming and proudly put their face to guarantee their work.

THE CELLAR

The cellar and warehouse of the Vecchio Consorzio 1953 are in Bacedasco Basso, in the municipality of Vernasca, in Val d’Arda. The building that now houses the company has been the headquarters of the agricultural consortium since the 1950s, a meeting point for at least a couple of generations of local farmers and farmers.

The shutter was permanently closed in 2005 and remained lowered for over fifteen years. The renovation works tried to respect the original architecture, including the barrel ceilings, which can be seen inside the warehouse.

The choice of this location implies the following message: the future of the territory can and indeed must look to tradition, enhancing the artisan agricultural model, where knowledge was enriched by the exchange of competencies and know how between peers.

THE PRODUCTS

The Vecchio Consorzio 1953 aims to contribute, through its wines, to increase the sustainability of the colli piacentini agri-food sector, in line with the European ‘Farm to fork’ strategy. The wines are the result of the processing of grapes grown under organic farming methods, while vinification is guided by the logic of low intervention, which envisages the exclusion of all wine-making aids; the absence of clarification and temperature control, also to reduce energy consumption in the cellar.

There are six labels on sales: 3 sparkling wines, following the tradition of natural refermentation in the bottle of the Apennines of Piacenza, 3 still wines. As for the sparkling wines, the labels represent the territorial blends, which are Trebbiano, Ortrugo and Sauvignon for the white “VERDERAME” and Malvasia di Candia Aromatica, Trebbiano and Ortrugo for the white “STRINGIMI FORTE”. Barbera and Croatina for the rosé ‘CIAO TRUCCATO’. The still wines, on the other hand, are obtained from the vinification of Malvasia di Candia Aromatica and Moscato Bianco, for the macerated white “POTENZA ARANCIONE”, and Barbera and Croatina for the rosé “ERA LA NOTTE” and the red “FILO DA TORCERE”.

Last but not the least, “SPACCO” is the dry cider refermented in the bottle thanks to indigenous yeast and produced out of old apples varieties from the nearby mountains.

The seven labels are designed by Tiziano Carboni, a local artist whom the two partners wanted to involve in the project. He was inspired by the rural history of the Colli piacentini and both the Croci and Gazzola families’ story.