Biography
The Orsolani cellars are at San Giorgio Canavese, in the heart of the Erbaluce di Caluso production zone. The firm was founded in 1894, when Giovanni Orsolani, with his wife Domenica, decided to return from the USA, driven by a certain nostalgia for his birthplace. The great-great-grandparents of the current owner opened a restaurant, the Locanda Aurora, Domenica worked in the kitchen while Giorgio took care of the vineyards and cellar to produce wine for the customers. The wine had success and the cellar expanded, to the point that the following generation decided to dedicate its efforts to wine on a fulltime basis. Gian Francesco, the father of the current owner, Gian Luigi, revolutionized Erbaluce production in the 1960’s, dedicating much time to the ripening and fermentation of the grapes. The decisive commitment to Erbaluce came in 1967 when the wine obtained appellation status. The result of these efforts, based entirely on the search for higher quality, brought the Orsolani cellars a dominant position over the past thirty years. Beginning in 1968, with the first production of sparkling wine, a true innovation at the time, the Orsolani cellars obtained DOC status for this type of wine as well. In 1985 La Rustia was born, a wine based on careful grape selection during the harvest, and demonstrated, for the first time, the possibility of using this variety for dry white wines as well. In 1988, after some years of experimentation, barriques were used for the fermentation of the dessert version of the wine in order to reduce oxidation during aging. The result is a great dessert wine, easily comparable to others – the non-aromatic type – in Italy. In 1996 with the Vignot – San Antonio and San Cristoforo – Orsolani introduced a concept of cru not based exclusively on a single grape source but also on techniques of fermentation and aging studied expressly for a precise type of wine. At the present time, Orsolani ferments solely Erbaluce from 37 acres of vineyards, producing 100,000 bottles annually. The finest wines, produced for over twenty years from an accurate grape selection in the finest zones of the township of Caluso are: Sulè Caluso Passito DOC; La Rustia Erbaluce di Caluso DOC; Cuvée Tradizione Caluso Spumante DOC, produced wiht the classic Champagne method.