l’Archetipo

Salento, Puglia, Italy

“The wine is just a tool” says Domenico, referring to the deeper vision of his family’s winery, l’Archetipo.  His father, Valentino, began the project in 2010 after co-founding one of Puglia’s first organic-certified wineries, and then pushing further into biodynamics.  A life-long farmer and trained agronomist, he still felt more was needed to bring life into his vineyards, and combined Steiner’s philosophy with learnings taken from the work of Masanobu Fukuoka to found l’Archetipo on the principles of Synergistic Agriculture.  

L’Archetipo - The Archetype - is about defining and striving towards an ideal expression of their land through their wines, while restoring the land to its primal form as a living, breathing entity, teeming with microflora and microfauna, persisting in equilibrium.  The wine is a tool not only to guide them towards regenerating their soils, but also to communicate the value of their broader mission to the world. 

Valentino and his children Carlo, Domenico, Andrea, and Maria Clelia work their 60 hectares (25 under vine) in complete and deep collaboration to farm ancient grains, rescue forgotten local grapes and some 50 varieties of cereal crops, and of course to produce some exceptional wines in their tufo cellar, built with their own hands and powered largely by solar panels on its roof.  None of this - it has been made very clear - would be possible without the love and support of the matriarch Anna Maria, the heart and soul of the operation.  

Protecting the humus they have spent so much time regenerating is their top priority, but no-till here does not mean ‘no work’, and the family constantly progresses their understanding of their locality to work in harmony with it.  A unique trellising system invented by Valentino is a prime example, training the vines to create a leafy unpruned canopy to harness the energy of the powerful Salento sun, while protecting the grapes from its direct heat, and allowing them to grow high enough not to be negatively impacted by the moisture and life maintained in the un-compacted soils and tall grasses below.   

The wines are produced exactly as they farm - intervening consciously, intelligently, and only where necessary to create greater balance and harmony.  What jumps out when speaking to the family about their wines, and when tasting them, is their precision.  Every choice has a clear reason, which is immediately evident in the glass.  Fermentations occur only with indigenous yeasts, cultivated in a pied de cuve to ensure vigorous fermentations and avoid volatility.  The wines are raised with no additions, and live nourished by their lees throughout to protect from oxidation.  The small additions of sulfur at bottling occur only for the sake of protecting the wines in transit - the family drinks their daily wine straight from the tanks, with no additions whatsoever.  Only a handful of seasonal workers join the family for harvest, which therefore unfolds over the course of several weeks.  Each wine is fermented in individual lots from each stage of the harvest, meaning that even within a single vintage each lot of each wine contains the signature of the moment it was picked.   

The three spirals in l’Archetipo’s logo represent the fundamental elements of their work - water, air, and earth.  Knowing them, there are undoubtedly many pages of subtleties contained in the symbol, but at its simplest it communicates the active restoration of harmony between these elements to produce soil, crops, and wines which are vibrant with life and energy.