Podere Le Ripi is a small biodynamic winery located in Montalcino (SI) and owned by Francesco Illy.
12 hectares of vineyards divided among Merlot, Syrah and the Sangiovese Grosso for the production of the famous wine Brunello di Montalcino. Francesco's aims are: quality and the respect of an uncontaminated nature. Biodynamic was a inevitable choice to encourage life in the soil, allowing micro-organisms to multiply and creating a rich, nutritious materials for the grapes. The wines become more complex as a result and the plants stay healthy exuding the joy of living.
To build the “Golden Cellar” more than 750.000 bricks have been manually laid down during a period of 4 years. In the centre the Dome, resembling the Pantheon of Rome and all around a vaulted tunnel enveloping the Dome for circa 2 turns.
The cellar is in a continue slope. Fermentation in the highest part, the bottling line as well as the ageing in the lowest one in order to allow us to do all the pourings by gravity, comfortably moving the tanks up and down with a fork lift.
In Podere Le Ripi you can visit the unique Bonsai Vineyards: the densest in the world. The vines are planted with only 40 centimeters distance from one another resulting in a density of 62.500 plants per hectare. This system force the plants to go through many different geological layers in a short time span, in fact the root competition of the Bonsai plantatations is made in such a way to result in a lack of nutrients created by such a throng of roots, especially in the first layer of the soil.
All this results in a great concentration in the grapes to end up into the wine.