Winemaker

Franco Custodi

Discipline: Winemaker
Venue: Cantina Custodi · Winery

Portrait of Franco Custodi

i. Biography

Franco Custodi founded Cantina Custodi in Orvieto in 1965, and that founding is the central fact around which the estate is read. In trade terms, the work is defined less by reinvention than by establishment: a winery set in place, a name attached to it, and a line of continuity that has held since the start. For Cantina Custodi, the founder’s name is not decorative. It is the point of origin.

Coming Up

The founder’s role at Cantina Custodi has remained fixed since 1965. That kind of continuity gives a practical clarity: the estate began with Franco Custodi, and the beginnings in Orvieto still frame how the work is understood. For another artisan, the useful detail is the structure itself—founding as authorship, and authorship as the basis of identity. In this case, the legacy sits in the fact of having set the estate in motion and remained attached to it. Orvieto is part of the winery’s identity because the winery was built there from the start. The 1965 founding ties Franco Custodi to place in a direct way, with no need for added narrative. The record is straightforward: a founder, a site, a year, and a name that continues to identify the estate. That is enough to define.

Where They Are Now

The defining association remains the founding of the winery. In trade language, this is a foundational role in the literal sense: the estate’s identity begins with the act of founding it in Orvieto in 1965.

Career - Founder — Cantina Custodi, Orvieto, Terni, Umbria, Italy (1965–present)

Signature

Orvieto Classico Belloro sits within the Cantina Custodi vocabulary as the named signature attached to Franco Custodi. The wine extends the founder’s association beyond the act of establishment and into the estate’s known work. In that sense, the signature functions as another fixed marker: a specific expression under the same long-standing name, place, and identity.

FAQ What is Franco Custodi's current role? Franco Custodi is the Founder of Cantina Custodi. Where did Franco Custodi work before? No earlier roles are listed before the founding of the winery.