guido marsella
Guido Marsella
Summonte
avellino, Campania - Italy
story…
Founded in 1995 by Guido Marsella who came to wine from the construction world where he was previously working for his family’s business in the Campania region. His facility and estate vines are located in the town of Summonte, which is a high elevation, hilly area in the Avellino DOCG area in Campania. Here he owns around 25 hectares of land, only about 8 hectares of that are under vine, all of which are planted to the Fiano grape. Marsella founded the winery with a single goal in mind, to produce truly world class white wines from the local Fiano grape. Having grown up in the region he had found memories of enjoying local bottlings of Fiano and felt that it could produce truly exceptional wines, but few were giving it enough attention to achieve this.
Interestingly enough it wasn’t that long ago that Fiano was widely acknowledged as one of, if not the greatest white variety coming out of Italy. But due to an increase in production and the number of subpar bottlings finding their way into the export market it quickly lost its luster in most circles. Though it had fallen out of favor in the public eye, there fortunately guys like Guido continued to see it’s potential to produced great wines. When farmed and produced with care, the wines can show unique combinations of aromatics and textures, as well as the ability to age incredibly well. All of which are telltale characteristics of a truly great wine. So thanks to the dedication and vision of guys like Guido, along with some other notable producers like Ciro Picariello who is located in the same town as Guido, the world is getting to enjoy and understand the greatness of Fiano again.
Although Fiano is Guido’s number one focus and passion he also produces small amounts of wine from the other two primary white grapes of Campania, Falanghina and Greco. It was only more recently that he began working with these two varieties, both coming from a parcel that he began working with and farming in 2007. The parcel, Poggi Reali, is located near Beneventano in the Greco di Tufo DOCG. Both his Beneventano Falanghina and Greco di Tufo bottlings are labeled with the Poggi Reali name.
farming & Philosophy…
All farming is done with organic practices, both on his estate owned vineyards and those that he farms just north east of his estate in the Greco di Tufo DOCG. Harvesting typically takes place a bit later here than at many other estate in the region, Guido prefers the fruit to be at the peak of ripeness and in some cases borderline overripe. All harvests are carried out by hand to ensure only high quality fruit is being brought back to the winery. Although the fruit comes in at high levels of ripeness the wines are never out of balance on the palate in any way, regardless of the higher abv levels, usually around 14%.
All of Guido’s wines are fermented and aged entirely in stainless steel containers, with some fine lees contact. The wine spends 12 months in tank before being bottled and then aged a further year in bottle at the winery before release. Guido was the first in the region to start holding his wines back that extra year before release, believing that Fiano needs time to really show its true potential. Though not a revolutionary idea for wine it was certainly something nobody in the Avellino region had considered doing with their Fiano prior to Guido doing it. Several producers in the region have since followed suit and begun to hold back some of their Fiano bottlings for an extra year before release.
Vineyards…
His estate vineyard that surrounds his modest winery facility in Summonte is comprised entirely of Fiano plantings that were planted in 1990. The estate sits on about 25 hectares of land, 8 of which are dedicated to vineyards. Located in the highest altitude area of Avellino, vineyard sits at around 750+ masl, and is comprised mostly of rocky-volcanic soils with a limestone-clay subsoil. Its this combination of high elevation and soils that Guido believes makes for great Fiano.
The vineyard where his Falanghina and Greco come from is situated on Tuffa clay soils at about 500 masl. The vines here date back between 20-30 years.
