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A Note from Sergio
In his professional life as the Chairman of Citigroup and the former Chairman and CEO of Time Warner/AOL, Richard Parsons knows a thing or two about surrounding himself with good people. It's a skill he brought with him when he bought Montalcino's Il Palazzone, one of IWM's favorite small producers of Brunello.
The twenty-acre Il Palazzone sits at the end of a rocky dirt road that's pitted with potholes and rife with washboards. It's a narrow road that forces you to pull your car off to the side when you see another coming, sometimes onto a narrow shoulder perched on a steep cliff that drops off perilously. When the trees part at the end of the road, you see an expanse of Montalcino pasture and vineyards, dotted with two stone houses that comprise the Il Palazzone estate. No one knows exactly how old these houses are, but they go back a few centuries. They're the kind of house that once held the animals on the first floor generating heat for the families who slept above.
Today, these ancient stone houses have all the modern conveniences--casa Parsons has a swimming pool and a state-of-the-art kitchen and it's impeccably decorated with exquisite modern art. The other house is the home to the family who live on the estate year-round, sometimes getting snowed in for a week at a time in the winter, and take care of the daily running of the estate. It's isolated, beautiful, a little rustic with General Manager Marco Sassetti's hunting spaniels kenneled in the back, and more than a little quirky.
The quirkiness is a reflection of the people who live and work on the estate. There's a broken--down ancient car--maybe one of those tiny Fiats that you see only in Europe-so overgrown with wildflowers that it seems a living sculpture. There's the neat grove of olive trees, many of them proudly wearing a ceramic plaque emblazoned with a name. People "adopt" the trees and in return get a photo from the point of view of the tree, a letter (penned by Laura Gray, Marco's wife and the Estate Manager), and a few bottles of the excellent Il Palazzone olive oil. The estate is just putting the finishing touches on its new cellar, an eco-friendly building designed in part by the estate's enologist Paolo Vagaggini. It sits in front of small grove of cherry and fruit trees. If you visit, you may be able to get some preserves.
The upshot is that Il Palazzone is the antithesis of a nameless, faceless corporate etntity; it's deeply human. And the estate brings this humanity to their wines. These are generous, open wines of great warmth, the kind of wines that you want to linger over and enjoy for hours. These are the wines that bring people together and hold them in that magical attenuated embrace that only shared experience can bring. They wouldn't be possible without Dick Parsons, a man who knows a thing or two about finding good people, and the good people who made them.
This week, I'm delighted to offer you a selection of Il Palazzone wines, including several vintages of their Brunello in various sizes. I'd say to get a couple of big bottles because nothing prolongs a good dinner with good people like a never-ending bottle of really good wine. Generosity is one of the great gifts of the human spirit. Celebrate it with Il Palazzone.
My Best,
P.S. You can now follow me on Twitter: @Italian_Wine_SE.
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