Enzo Boglietti

One bunch left on the cane

At veraison, Enzo Boglietti, winemaker at Enzo Boglietti in La Morra, keeps the crop severe: one bunch per cane, with another pass before harvest if the clusters are too abundant. The decision belongs to a life that began in mixed farming, among grapes, dairy cows, milk, and cheese, before the family turned its own fruit into commercial wine in 1991. Enzo co-founded the estate that year with his brother Gianni, after generations of Boglietti work in La Morra had sold grapes rather than bottle them. The cellar began with nearly 3 hectares of inherited land, a converted stable, borrowed equipment, a restored basket press, and the counsel of local producers including Alessandro Fantino, Roberto Voerzio, Andrea Oberto, and Eraldo Viberti. Bartolo Mascarello visited in those early years and wished the new business luck. The family history reaches back through grandfather Matteo Boglietti, born 1899, with holdings in Brunate, Boiolo, Roscaleto, and Bricco del Dente, and through Giovanni Montanaro, born 1900, whose Fossati farmhouse and vineyard parcel came by Enzo’s mother’s side. Today Enzo works with Linda and Matteo at the winery, keeping the family name tied to estate-grown Nebbiolo, Dolcetto, and Barbera.

Short Guyot, native yeast, submerged skins

The estate farms 22 hectares across La Morra, Barolo, Monforte, Serralunga d’Alba, Roddino, and Sinio, with no purchased grapes. Organic conversion began in 2014, and all grapes have held official organic certification since the 2017 vintage. The pruning is short Guyot: 5–6 buds for Dolcetto and Barbera, 7–8 for Nebbiolo. New vineyards average 7,000 vines per hectare. Late spring and early summer bring canopy work for air and spacing; harvest is by hand. In the winery, fruit is sorted, destemmed, and crushed on arrival, then fermented with indigenous yeast in wooden vats, stainless steel automatic horizontal vats, or vertical stainless tanks. After pressing, the wines move through spontaneous malolactic fermentation, racking, and élevage in oak vats from 1.5 kl to 7.5 kl, barrels from 600 lt to 225 lt, or concrete. The Barolo program has moved away from the heavier new oak and extraction of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Steccatura, the old Piedmontese method of manually inserting oak staves into wooden vats after alcoholic fermentation, keeps the skins submerged for several months. All Barolos are bottled unfiltered; production ranges from 15,000 to 21,000 bottles by vintage.

A cellar made from the farm

The cellar still carries the logic of a farm that changed use rather than character. The family converted stables into working space, brought grandfather Matteo’s basket press back into service, and built a winery around fruit they already knew by row and season. In the tasting room, the modern, linear labels by cousin Ivana Boglietti sit against a quieter agricultural memory: Brunate, Case Nere, Fossati, Boiolo, Arione, names that point back to parcels rather than branding. La Morra gives the wines their lighter, more aromatic register through Tortonian soils with less limestone, more sand, and significant clay. The room is quiet enough for that distinction to stay audible.

Brunate on the family line

The estate’s next chapter is already inside the work of Linda and Matteo, not as a declared break, but as daily continuity beside Enzo in the vines and cellar. The through-line remains the same: estate fruit, low yields, organic farming, and Barolo shaped toward elegance rather than force. In La Morra, that future still runs through Brunate Barolo.