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Azienda Agricola Schiopetto sits in Capriva del Friuli, in the Collio hills of Friuli. Mario Schiopetto built it from leased vines into one of the founding estates of modern Italian white wine. In 1965 he bottled the first pure 'Tocai', the wine now called Friulano, and changed what Italian whites could be. Today the estate farms four sites across the Collio and the Colli Orientali. The Rotolo family keeps Mario's style alive: steel tanks, native grapes, one grape per bottle.
Friuli Venezia Giulia
Mario Schiopetto was born in 1930 in Capriva del Friuli. His parents were innkeepers who ran the Osteria ai Pompieri at the foot of the Palazzo Arcivescovile. Mario worked as a fireman and a truck driver before he took over the wine list at the family inn. In 1963 he began making wine, guided by his own taste alone. Two years later he bottled the first pure 'Tocai' Friulano. Italians still treat that bottle as the start of the modern Friulian white: one grape on its own, made for elegance and identity, not for blending into generic table wine.
Mario looked far beyond Friuli. He travelled Europe and the United States with the wine critic Luigi Veronelli. He worked with Müller-Späth at the research cellar in Bad Kreuznach, and brought temperature and oxygen control to winemaking in Friuli. He bought pine training stakes in Germany and vine cuttings in France. Through the late 1960s and 1970s he belonged to the small group of producers who pulled Italian wine into the modern era. Its members included Piero Antinori, Angelo Gaja, the Ceretto brothers, Giacomo Bologna, Maurizio Zanella, the Biondi Santi family and Niccolò Incisa della Rocchetta.
The vines grow on ponca, the local marl of limestone and clay, across four sites. The home cru in Capriva covers about 25 football pitches of Collio hillside. It is planted with Friulano, Pinot Bianco, Malvasia, Sauvignon, Pinot Grigio and Ribolla Gialla. Zegla and Pradis sit in the same Collio strip. Oleis, in the Colli Orientali, adds about 11 football pitches of Merlot, Refosco, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Sauvignon and Pinot Grigio. In the cellar almost everything happens in steel tanks, with cold and oxygen controlled at every step. Mario summed it up as 'French elegance, German technology, native grapes'. The official site still uses his words as its brief.
The range splits into two tiers. The Linea Mario Schiopetto is the top tier, with one bottling each of Friulano, Pinot Bianco, Malvasia, Sauvignon and Pinot Grigio. The selection wines Amrità, Rivarossa and Podere dei Blumeri sit above them. The Linea del Pompiere is the everyday Collio range. Its anchor is Blanc des Rosis, the estate's historic white blend, joined by Ribolla Gialla, Pinot Grigio, Friulano, Sauvignon and a Collio Merlot. Friulano remains the signature grape, and the first bottle to try.
Mario died in 2003. His children Maria Angela, Carlo and Giorgio carried the estate into the 2010s. In April 2014 the Rotolo family, Emilio and his son Alessandro, took over and kept the Schiopetto method intact. Visitors can book two experiences: a one-hour tasting of the five most iconic wines, or a longer cellar and vineyard visit that ends with the same five glasses. There are also four guest rooms at Al Pompiere, above the vines, for anyone who wants to stay the night.
Plate I · FRIULI VENEZIA GIULIA
Wine area
Friuli's most decorated white-wine zone, hugging the Slovenian border above Gorizia.
Winery
Capriva del Friuli, Gorizia · Collio Goriziano
4 tastings and 1 stay, checked by our editors. From €25.
Tasting & Tour
Completed in 1993, Mario Schiopetto's winery represents a milestone in Friulian viticulture. Visit the winery and taste 5 Collio wines
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Tasting
Let the knowledgeable team of Mario Schioppetto's winery guide you to discover the renowned Friulian white wines
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Tasting
A one-hour walk through the five most iconic Schiopetto bottlings at the Osteria al Pompiere, the small osteria a few steps from the cellar. Groups of one to twenty.
on schiopetto.it
Tasting & Tour
A two-and-a-half-hour walk through the Schiopetto vineyards and the Mario Schiopetto cellar, ending with the same five-wine tasting at the cantina. Groups of one to twenty.
on schiopetto.it
Accommodation
Four rooms above the Collio vineyards next to the cellar (double, double superior and suite), with breakfast on a panoramic terrace. Run by Schiopetto's own Al Pompiere wine and rooms operation.
on schiopetto.it
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Azienda Agricola Schiopetto's current bottle selection is easiest to understand through Friulano and Sauvignon Blanc.
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Est. 1965 
14 wines 
Tastings
Tours
Accommodation
Booking required 
