Cascina Gilli

Freisa first, from the hill

Freisa and Malvasia set the line before the estate had fully taken shape. Gianni Vergnano, winemaker at Cascina Gilli in Castelnuovo Don Bosco, began with those local grapes in the early 1980s, then founded the winery in 1983 around the land he believed could carry them. His station has remained here, on the Basso Monferrato hills between Castelnuovo Don Bosco and Albugnano, where the work favors native varieties over borrowed prestige.

The lineage is not presented as a chain of named masters. It is rooted in the site and in Vergnano’s long attention to the grapes around it: Freisa, Malvasia di Castelnuovo Don Bosco, Barbera, Bonarda, and Nebbiolo. The estate’s own historic frame reaches further back, to a villa built in 1700, but the modern cellar belongs to the decision he made in 1983. He turned recovery into a method, giving underestimated Piedmontese varieties a steady address and enough time on the tools to become the argument of the house.

White marl under native vines

The vineyards sit on greyish white terra bianca, the Marne di Sant’Agata formation that runs through this part of Monferrato Astigiano. Cascina Gilli works about 20 hectares, a medium sized estate by the standards of the route, with Freisa, Malvasia di Schierano, Barbera, Nebbiolo, and Bonarda at the center of the program. The grapes are not decorative local color here. They are the cellar’s grammar.

One wine gives the method a precise place name: Freisa d’Asti Il Forno DOC, made from 100% Freisa from Vigna del Forno, a single vineyard selection on the estate. The house also makes Malvasia di Castelnuovo Don Bosco DOC from Malvasia di Schierano, sweet and lightly sparkling, a style tied closely to Castelnuovo Don Bosco rather than to the better known Piedmont canon. Steel aging appears across several labels where freshness and fruit need a clean line; barrel aging is reserved for selected wines that ask for more structure. The discipline is selection, not noise.

The terrace above the cellar

The room carries the calm of an old cascina adapted for wine rather than display. Tastings move between an indoor lounge and a terrace that looks over vineyard covered hills, with the estate set along the Terra dei Santi wine route. Conversation stays at cellar pace. Glasses arrive with the names of grapes that still feel local in the mouth: Freisa, Bonarda, Malvasia.

Outside, the garden and terraces give the vineyards back to the tasting room. The historic villa anchors the scene, but the bench-side detail remains in the glass, especially when Malvasia di Castelnuovo Don Bosco follows the reds and changes the register from tannin to frizzante sweetness. Vergnano’s next move does not need announcing; the work remains in the native varieties, and Vigna del Forno is still the address inside the bottle.