Marco de Bartoli

Marco de Bartoli, in his youth, Marco had worked with his father on his family's farm near the city of Marsala. But his obsession with cars and his need for speed proved too strong, leading to his first career as a professional racing driver.

Towards the end of this race, however, Marco was ready to turn the page. Looking back on his youth, he felt deep sadness that Marsala's ancient prideful tradition had sunk so low.

He decided he wanted to change this. First, Marco rebuilt his family's old basement on his mother's farm in the Samperi cons. Then he looked everywhere for old Grillo solera barrels from the local contadini.

To his surprise, many were eager to part ways with these ancient relics, some were even happy to give them to him for free! Then came the strains, planted progressively and exclusively in Grillo, which in Marco's eyes was and is THE ONLY grape to make Marsala due to its high acidity, ability to reach high degrees of alcohol and aging potential.

Finally, the wines: "Vecchio Samperi" represented the traditional unfortified style of Marsala, while the "Superiore" line was fortified with mistella (sweet must and brandy) as a statement that the canteen was not only rooted in the past, but also versed in the present and the future.

In 1984, Marco started a new project on the island of Pantelleria, originally producing only one Passito. By the early 1990s, he had built a stellar reputation for being the only one to make truly impressive expressions of the Marsala terroir. But the story does not end there. By the mid-1990s, Marco's children, Renato, Sebastiano, and Giusippina, had joined him in this work. The youthful energy led to new experiments, especially dry white wines from Grillo and later Zibibbo from Pantelleria.

While chemicals had never been used in the vineyards and the Cricket for Marsala was never leaven, conventional yeasts were used in the dry whites until 2006. Sebastiano makes the organic work and the use of native yeast fermentations: “Our idea always It was making wine as a product of the earth, which is why we have always avoided systemic chemicals.

I do not remember a particular date in which we followed this (organic) course, but I can tell you that about ten years ago I personally started following this campaign and since then I am sure. I clearly remember that even before, my father did not want to do intensive farming and prevented the farmer who worked our land from using fertilizers, herbicides, etc. So far we haven't pursued organic certification because it didn't seem like a serious approach and my father's point of view was never that "organic" was a selling point for his work. But my dad was extreme and today organics seem to be a more serious problem.

We understand the need for people to have the certification, so now we are looking for it. For native yeasts, the key was the development of "Integer" in 2006. I am not denying the selected yeast used in the 90s because it allowed us to understand an innovative way of Grillo and Zibibbo.

But with the Integer experiments we understood that the potential of the land was much more important than many other things, knowing also that it was more risky. It may not always be the same for the tastes and aromas of the wine, but it certainly enhances the territorial typicity.”