Est. 1983 
11 wines 
Tastings
Tours
Accommodation
Booking required 
Volcanic Wines, Pantelleria
Sixty-minute tasting at the Pantelleria cellar focused on the volcanic wines of the island, including the Passito di Pantelleria DOC Ben Ryè and the dry Zibibbo Lighea.
Book this experienceDonnafugata
Sicily, ItalyDonnafugata works five Sicilian estates from a single family base in Marsala, weaving Contessa Entellina in the Belice valley with island vineyards on Pantelleria, Etna and the Cerasuolo di Vittoria zone in Acate. Its iconic wines, from Ben Ryè to Mille e una Notte, set the modern reference for Sicilian fine wine.
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Sicily
- Est. 1983
- 11 wines
- Tastings
- Tours
- Accommodation
- Booking required
Wines from Donnafugata
Experiences at Donnafugata
Bookable experiences, curated by our editors. External booking where marked.
La Tonnara, Marsala
Ninety-minute tasting in the historic Marsala baglio, weaving the Donnafugata range into the island's tuna-fishing heritage.
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Donna Vittoria, Acate
One-hundred-minute gourmet experience at the Vittoria estate with refined food pairings drawn from the Cerasuolo di Vittoria DOCG zone.
Book this experienceVolcanic Wines, Pantelleria
Sixty-minute tasting at the Pantelleria cellar focused on the volcanic wines of the island, including the Passito di Pantelleria DOC Ben Ryè and the dry Zibibbo Lighea.
Book this experienceAbout Donnafugata
Giacomo Rallo and his wife Gabriella Anca Rallo founded Donnafugata in 1983, building on a Marsala wine-trading family that already counted four generations of fortified-wine craftsmanship. The brief was to redirect that heritage toward dry Sicilian wines that could stand internationally without leaning on the Marsala name. The historic baglio cellars at Via S. Lipari became the headquarters, and remain the physical centre of the estate today.
The Rallo family runs the company across five terroirs. Contessa Entellina, in the Belice valley between Palermo and Trapani, anchors the Bordeaux-style reds Mille e una Notte and Tancredi alongside the Anthìlia and Sursur whites. The Pantelleria estate at Khamma works terraced Zibibbo, including a century-old ungrafted vineyard replanted in 1999 from phylloxera-survivor vines, for the Passito di Pantelleria DOC Ben Ryè and the dry Lighea. Acate, in the Cerasuolo di Vittoria DOCG zone, produces Floramundi and the Frappato-led Bell'Assai. The Randazzo estate on the northern slope of Etna delivers Sul Vulcano Bianco and Rosso, both Etna DOC. The Marsala baglio remains the visitor cellar and ageing facility for the wider range.
The wine programme focuses on unblended-terroir clarity over volume. Ben Ryè has become the international benchmark for Passito di Pantelleria, while Mille e una Notte sits among the most ageworthy Sicilian reds of the past two decades. Sul Vulcano showed early on what an outsider Etna estate could deliver from contrada-driven viticulture, and the Sicily-wide Anthìlia and Sursur whites carry the everyday-bottle weight of the range.
Sustainability work runs in parallel. The estate joined the SOStain Sicilia Foundation in 2021, mapped its operations against nine UN Sustainable Development Goals in 2022, became the first wine producer worldwide to adopt the Nomacorc Ocean recycled-coastal-plastic closure in 2023, and published its first formal Sustainability Report in 2025. Vineyard practice combines minimum tillage, mechanical weeding, organic fertilization and integrated pest management across all five estates.
Antonio and José Rallo, children of the founders, lead the company today. Gabriella's role as a founding member of Le Donne del Vino and a pioneer of Sicilian feminine viticulture remains a defining part of the estate's identity, visible in the trademark labels that translate Sicilian colour and storytelling into the bottle range.
Visiting Donnafugata
Editorially verified by ItalianWines.co.uk.
Tastings
Available
Tours
Available
Accommodation
Not available
Booking
Required
Plan your visit
Via S. Lipari, 18, 91025 Marsala, Trapani (Sicilia)
Plate I · SICILY
Donnafugata on the Sicily wine atlas
What Donnafugata makes
Donnafugata's current bottle selection is easiest to understand through Nerello Mascalese and Nero d'Avola.
Key grapes
Common questions
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Donnafugata is headquartered in Marsala, in western Sicily's Trapani province, with four further working estates at Contessa Entellina in the Belice valley, on the volcanic islands of Pantelleria and Etna, and in Acate within the Cerasuolo di Vittoria DOCG zone.
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