Olivier Lemasson Monaco R19 Spiritoso

Olivier Lemasson got his start in as a Danilo Marcucci’s painstaking education in “old ways” Italian in Brittany. The mysterious wine took almost twenty years and gravitating force of before finally settling down on natural wine brought him to his family’s estate just outside t h e w i n e r y o f M a r c e l of Perugia, Umbria. This would be an absurd amount of time Lapierre ( wizard and for someone just looking to one of the founding fathers learn a bit here and there of the French natural wine about managing a or m o v e m e n t ) w h e r e h e checking your fermentations were going right, so after worked four successive spending a few days in his harvests and one full year in cellar, it became clear to me that he is uniquely, unusually obsessed with natural wine. the cellar. Then in 2002, Signposts along his career path point in all different directions. After working Olivier moved to Touraine in a legal office (briefly) he picked up a few shifts in a prestigious wine store in Tuscany whose owners had become convinced that their money would be made selling the () and started a coveted Chateaux of France, California, and in turn, those Italian made in their small négociant operation image which showcased huge plush fruit and woody tannins. Danilo told me of a trade called Les Vins Contés, tasting that changed his life working that job, where an exclusive group of merchants purchasing fruit and making gathered at his shop to try future samples of the 2000 Bordeaux . The morning after he was so ill he had to see the doctor and swore he would never be involved with w i n e a l o n g s i d e H e r v é wine again. An encounter about a year later with his nearby friends the Mattioli family Villemade, another producer of Collecapretta set his passion in motion again though—their unsulfured organic whose wines are a staple here at the shop. Olivier has continued to wines made with the traditional grapes in contadino style led as examples of what was maintain the project on his own, and acquired some of his own vines possible with that philosophy in mind all throughout central Italy. Through the early to mid-oughts Danilo accumulated formative experience along the way. Made from a blend of Grolleau, Cab Franc, Gamay and with some the masters like Valentini, Massa Vecchia, Barbacarlo, and Maule. A yearly Côt, R19 is a portrait of the 2019 vintage (just as R18 was for 2018, byline in legendary wine mag Porthos also gave him a crucial outlet to scribe polemic etc…). The *slightly* cooler season means this doesn’t taste like articles on the “state” of natural wine in Italy which was totally unheard of given the , though it is still darker than Loire reds of yesteryear—it complex regional diversities its adherents are well aware of. These investigations led Danilo back to Perugia where he now makes wine in an old stable on his in-law’s displays a spicy depth, cool-toned dark fruit and crunchy minerals with palatial property, the Conestabile della Staffa. verve and freshness. If you could pull off the side of the road and drink Danilo is just as much of a conservationist as he is winemaker - preserving old from a babbling brook in the Loire, this is what it would taste vine DNA through replanting and experimenting with what comes of the fruit of like. Chill this down for 20 minutes, and then grab some crispy tripe obscure native grape varieties is the key to all of his endeavors. He happens to also love drinking the lightly bubbly wines made in a pet nat or ancestral method. tacos from La Chaparrita, or a fried chicken sandwich from our new The Spiritoso is a mix of Umbria’s own Canaiolo, , and made as favorite, Hermosa. This wine calls out to be paired with lots of fat, flavor . It’s dry and peppery and would be beautiful with a bitter green or radicchio salad and soul. -BT dressed with love. -MAC ABOLITION IS AN

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