Mattoni Valter

Valter Mattoni, born in 1960, is a man almost physically immersed in wine, locked up in the small cellar where he volunteers himself as a prisoner of his small, passionate production. The art of winemaking comes to him from previous generations: grandfather Nazzareno, who boasted that he never drank a drop of water, not even while washing his face; grandfather Giuseppe, who similarly made his own wine at home; and then father Gaspare, the last in order of time to pass on the family's dedication and traditions. Roccia is the nickname of our Piceno winemaker, originally devoted to the work of interior decorator and painter, but hostage to other flamboyant passions such as antiques and motorcycling. The first wine saw the light of day in the year 2000: Arshura became an iconic label, an exemplary expression of an atavistic thirst and a no-nonsense interpretation of a territory and varietal.

Azienda Agricola Valter Mattoni is based in Castorano, in the province of Ascoli Piceno, the southernmost and least conspicuous part of the Marche region. The territory, devoted to viticulture since centuries immemorial, is characterized by very rough slopes, tending longitudinally and parallel to the coast, directed toward the valley of the Tronto River, which flows on the border with Abruzzo. The Adriatic Sea is a few kilometers away, at the height of Porto d'Ascoli, and the altitudes reach an elevation of about 300 meters: behind it rise the first spurs of the Gran Sasso and Maiella massifs. The soils consist substantially of clay, derived from soils of ancient alluvial origin, scattered with crushed stone and stony skeleton. The varieties grown are those typical of this area straddling the two regions, on a total area of about 5 hectares: Montepulciano and Trebbiano, tended according to nature, without intervention with synthetic chemical products, flanked by a small vineyard more than 60 years old planted in Sangiovese and a few hectares in Bordò, an ancient local variety of Grenache, with rooted cuttings derived from a 100-year-old vineyard.

In the winery, Valter Mattoni continues the family tradition of making his own wine, with only pressing and racking on his part and no use of chemicals. Spontaneous fermentations normally take place in steel, while French oak barriques, new as well as second or third passage, are reserved for aging. Production is around 7,000 bottles per year, all of them heartfelt personal creations uninterruptedly linked to previous generations.