Arianna Occhipinti

Arianna Occhipinti wines: buy at the best price

A leading figure in Italian natural wine, Arianna Occhipinti is a Sicilian winemaker based in Vittoria, in the province of Ragusa, in south-eastern Sicily. Since 2004, she has been crafting wines of rare authenticity, made from indigenous grape varieties grown using biodynamic methods. Her cuvées, driven by Frappato and Nero d'Avola, offer a precise and luminous expression of the Sicilian terroir, far removed from the powerful and alcoholic wines long associated with the island. 

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Occhipinti Il Frappato 2019
1 in stock
126976
Red
75cl
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Outside France | Italie - Sicile

Occhipinti Il Frappato 2019

€42.00 inc-VAT per bottle
€35.00 ex-VAT

History of Arianna Occhipinti

The story of Domaine Arianna Occhipinti is one of an early vocation. At sixteen, Arianna accompanied her uncle Giusto Occhipinti, winemaker at the renowned estate COS, to the Vinitaly wine fair. This first encounter with the world of wine sealed her destiny. After studying agronomy and oenology in Milan, she returned to her native land, determined to produce great wines in keeping with ancient traditions. In 2004, barely twenty-two years old, she purchased a single hectare of abandoned vines at the foot of the Iblei mountains, near Vittoria, and released her first cuvées.

Success was immediate. Her wines, fresh, fluid and elegant, revealed an unprecedented face of Sicilian viticulture. Over successive vintages, the estate expanded: recovery of old Frappato and Nero d'Avola vines on the contrade of Bombolieri, Bastonaca and Pettineo, purchase of the Azienda Bombolieri in 2012, then planting of Grillo at Santa Margherita in 2016. Today, the estate covers around thirty hectares of vines and olive trees, equipped with a contemporary gravity-flow winery, and has established itself as one of the essential references in natural artisan wine.

Terroirs and Vines of Arianna Occhipinti

The terroir of Arianna Occhipinti unfolds around Vittoria, at the heart of Sicily's only DOCG, Cerasuolo di Vittoria. The vines thrive across several historic contrade with varied soils: marine sands, limestone, red clays and tufa, often resting on beds of limestone rock. Planted between 280 and nearly 500 metres of altitude for the Grillo of Santa Margherita, they benefit from cool nights and significant diurnal temperature variations, guarantors of freshness and tension in the wines. Not a single drop of irrigation ever reaches these plots, a radical choice under the Sicilian sun.

The vineyard has been farmed biodynamically since 2009, with green cover crops in alternating rows and treatments limited to copper and sulphur. Indigenous grape varieties reign supreme: the Frappato, floral and delicate, which has become the estate's signature; the Nero d'Avola, structured and deep; as well as the white varieties Albanello, Zibibbo and Grillo. Each contrada, from Pettineo with its fine sands to the more saline Fossa di Lupo, tells its own geological story in the glass.

Vinifications of Arianna Occhipinti

Vinification at Arianna Occhipinti favours the natural and non-interventionist approach. Fermentations are conducted with indigenous yeasts, without any additions, and the reds undergo long macerations of thirty to fifty days, either in steel tanks or concrete vats. The wines are neither fined nor filtered, and sulphur is used only in very small doses, sometimes at the end of ageing to preserve the work accomplished. Each cuvée thus retains a faithful imprint of its original plot.

Ageing varies according to the wines: six months in tank for the SP68, up to several years in large 25-hectolitre Slavonian oak foudres for the single-vineyard cuvées and the Cerasuolo di Vittoria. Bottle ageing completes this patient process. Here, vinification is never an end in itself but a means of crafting great terroir wines, precise, straight and deeply Sicilian.

The Cuvées of Arianna Occhipinti

SP68 Rosso: the estate's emblematic cuvée, named after the provincial road that runs alongside the cellar. This blend of Frappato (around 70%) and Nero d'Avola seduces with its crunchy fruit, its freshness and its indulgent drinkability, while retaining genuine depth. A wine of pleasure, lively and elegant.

SP68 Bianco: the white counterpart, made from Albanello and Zibibbo (Moscato d'Alessandria), sometimes macerated. A sap of yellow fruits, plenty of freshness and an exhilarating balance make it an original and thirst-quenching white that invites you to travel.

Il Frappato: 100% Frappato from old vines, this floral and elegant wine is the one that most resembles Arianna in her own words — courageous, original and deeply Sicilian. Its finesse sometimes evokes that of the great red wines of Burgundy.

Siccagno: 100% Nero d'Avola grown dry, without irrigation. A pure and sincere expression of Sicily's king grape, this wine combines rigour, harmony, rich substance and great acidity, with a hint of austerity in its youth that blossoms with time.

Grotte Alte: the flagship cuvée of the estate and its sole DOCG appellation, Cerasuolo di Vittoria Classico, a blend of Frappato and Nero d'Avola from the oldest vines. Long ageing of several years in foudre, maritime sapidity and saline minerality: Arianna describes it as the most ambitious of her wines, elegant and proud.

Vino di Contrada PT (Pettineo): 100% Frappato from the oldest vines in Vittoria, planted on fine orange sand resting on calcareous tufa. Expressive fruitiness and fine, silky tannins characterise this high-quality single-vineyard wine.

Vino di Contrada BB (Bombolieri): 100% Frappato born on the most limestone-rich plot, with a deep colour. This small plot confers remarkable finesse and a chiselled structure to the wine.

Vino di Contrada FL (Fossa di Lupo): 100% Frappato from Arianna's original vineyard, on brown sand and limestone rock. Arianna identifies a lovely salinity and a distinctive earthy note there.

Bianco di Contrada SM (Santa Margherita): a single-vineyard white of Grillo, the fruit of several years of research, planted at nearly 500 metres of altitude on marine marl-limestone soils, amid pine and olive trees. A fresh, taut and saline wine, a rare expression of altitude in Sicily.

Passo Nero (Passonero): passito of Nero d'Avola, a sweet and confidential wine made from dried grapes. A rarer cuvée that completes the range with a sweet and concentrated expression of Sicily's great grape variety.

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