Azienda Agricola F.lli Cigliuti

Between vineyard and cellar

The cellar work stays close to the vineyard work for Silvia Cigliuti, winemaker at Azienda Agricola F.lli Cigliuti in Neive. She moves through a family estate where the division of labor is practical rather than theatrical: Claudia handles marketing and sales, while both sisters work in the cellar and among the vines. Silvia trained at Scuola Enologica di Alba, then returned the technical frame of that education to a house built on continuity. Since 2000, she has been winemaker and family owner here, carrying the Fratelli Cigliuti name through the daily decisions that shape Nebbiolo, Barbera, and Dolcetto.

The lineage is not outsourced. Silvia has said the estate has no consultant because her father is so experienced, and that sentence explains much of the method. Renato Cigliuti, son of a grape and bulk wine seller, took over the family business in 1964 and turned it toward bottling under its own name, quality over volume, and lower yields when that gesture still looked strange to neighbors. The house began in 1960, but its present discipline comes from that later choice: keep the work close, keep the fruit estate-grown, and let Serraboella set the terms.

Serraboella sets the measure

The estate farms 8.5 hectares across two crus, with 5.5 hectares in Serraboella and 3 hectares in Bricco di Neive. The family’s own account puts 90% of the winemaking in the vineyard, and the cellar follows that proportion. Grapes are harvested by hand, then ferment with indigenous yeasts for 15–20 days; maceration also runs 15–20 days, long enough for Nebbiolo to take color, tannin, and the quieter signatures of calcareous marl, sand, and clay.

Oak enters as a vessel, not a disguise. The wines age in larger Slavonian botti, with some barriques, a program suited to Barbaresco’s need for time without losing perfume. Barbaresco DOCG requires 26 months of aging, including 9 months in wood, while Riserva requires 50 months. Cigliuti’s known range, Barbaresco Serraboella, Barbaresco Vie Erte, Barbera Campass, and Barbera Serraboella, reads like a map of the property: named rows, named slopes, repeated work.

The quiet of a working farm

The place is a family winery and farm on the Serraboella hills, near Neive, with the room held at the pace of agricultural work. The vineyard surrounds the estate rather than decorating it. In the tasting room, the attention returns to cru, exposure, and vintage; in the cellar, the vessels hold the same argument in another form. The atmosphere is quiet, farmer-driven, and resistant to performance.

That restraint matters because the estate’s scale keeps the hands visible. Cigliuti is a small family-run property, focused on vineyard work and limited Barbaresco and Langhe production rather than expansion. The next release is not announced here as spectacle. It will be read, as this house has long asked to be read, through Serraboella, Vie Erte, Campass, and the Cigliuti cellar.