This is the maxim of the Tuscan winery Tua Rita: this is how a very small vineyard parcel became a proud name that the wine world can no longer imagine doing without. And quite simply because the wines speak for themselves.At the beginning, it is just a small plant that has to grow. Stretching towards the sky to grow bigger and finding its way in the dark soil to take root where it finds strength and nutrients. The story of today's exceptional Tuscan winery Tua Rita in the Maremma began similarly small, just as a vine develops into a sturdy vine. Actually, Rita Tua and Virgilio Bisti were only looking for a country estate for their retirement. When the story of Tua Rita began in 1984, the two of them owned just a two-hectare vineyard and nine hectares of olive trees. But the very next year, a big frost destroyed the olive trees - and so the two replaced them with vines. Over the years, the vineyard grew steadily to its current 60 hectares. This is due in no small part to their son-in-law Stefano Frascolla, who has a good hand for marketing and has turned the winery from the former contemplative "garage winery" into a much respected name all over the world. With his son Giovanni Frascolla, the third generation has already joined the family business.
The winery concentrates on red grape varieties such as Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon. Located near the picturesque town of Suvereto, between the Colline Metallifere - the Tuscan Ore Mountains or literally the "metal-bearing hills" - and the Tyrrhenian Sea, the winery boasts an excellent location for the vinification of the grapes. For, as the name of the surrounding mountains already suggests, the soils of the hills in the upper Maremma are particularly characterised by their constant slope: The volcanic primary rock here provides a high proportion of zinc and iron. It is also interspersed with the pink quartz stone and red marble typical of the area. The vines stand on this subsoil only a few kilometres from the Mediterranean Sea. Every day, a fresh breeze blows over the leaves from here, ensuring that the vines remain healthy and the climate is balanced. At Tua Rita, enthusiasm for the potential of these natural attributes is combined with quality without compromise. "The management of the vineyard has the fundamental objective of helping the plants to defend themselves and, above all, to ensure the health of the soil and the environment using natural methods. The wines, with varying degrees of complexity, express a common element: the personality of this terroir, with notes of iron and an intensely spicy flavour," the winemaker tells us.
And he continues: "We have the greatest respect for the raw material." After all, it forms the basis of everything. The striving for top quality is also reflected in the fact that, depending on the vintage, between three and five harvests are carried out per vineyard, because only perfectly ripened grapes are allowed to find their way into wines that become the flagship of the winery. Wines such as the single-varietal Merlot Redigaffi, for example, which achieved 100 points from Robert Parker for an Italian wine for the first time with the 2000 vintage and thus brought Tua Rita onto the big stage of wine - and thus manifested that the roots of the winery have dug deep into the soil of the Maremma.