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Ca’ Avignone is a small estate at Villa di Teolo, in the volcanic Euganean Hills south-west of Padua. Nicola Ercolino and Antonella La Sala left the city about fifteen years ago to farm here. Their plots of one to two hectares lie at Arquà Petrarca, Torreglia and on two of the hills. The winemakers Andrea Boaretti and Roberto Cipresso advise them. The five wines run from a cloudy Glera fizz to a Colli Euganei DOC red aged in oak. Four-wine tastings with local food run Thursday to Saturday, booked online.
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Nicola Ercolino and Antonella La Sala are a couple of entrepreneurs who had long wanted to work the land. About fifteen years ago they left the city for the hills south of Padua, at Arquà Petrarca, and started Ca’ Avignone. The cellar and the tasting room are at Villa di Teolo, inside the Euganean Hills regional park. They run the place themselves. Guests on Winedering describe Nicola explaining the wines and Antonella preparing the platter. Two consulting winemakers work with them. Andrea Boaretti knows the volcanic soils of these hills, and Roberto Cipresso shaped the first wines. The couple also run a wholesale business that selects wines from Argentina, Champagne and Tokaj for the trade.
The Euganean Hills are old volcanoes that rise straight out of the Po plain. The soil is what the estate talks about most. The vines grow between 50 and 200 metres on marl, clay and volcanic rock. The Il Canto vineyard on Monte Cecilia faces south-west on latite and trachyte, two volcanic stones. The plots are small, one to two hectares each, no more than three football pitches. They lie at Arquà Petrarca, Torreglia and on Monte Gemola. Half the red vines are over thirty years old. The rest are newer plantings.
Five wines come out of these plots. The biggest of them, 3Tinto, runs to about 10,000 bottles a year. Cicale, named for the cicadas heard at dawn and dusk in these hills, is a frizzante made from Glera the old way. The wine goes into the bottle with a little unfermented Moscato must and its own yeasts, and ferments a second time in there. It is never filtered, so the lees stay in the bottle. You can pour it clear, or shake the sediment up for a sharper, more citrus glass. Cicale Il Canto is a dry sparkling wine of Garganega, Glera and Pinella, made by the Charmat method and extra brut. 3Tinto, named for its three grapes, is the red: Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Carménère, fermented with native yeasts, aged in concrete and never filtered. In recent vintages the Carménère has given way to a disease-resistant variety. The 3Tinto Riserva is the estate's Colli Euganei DOC. It is built on Cabernet Franc with Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, and spends 15 to 17 months in neutral oak barrels. The estate made 4,500 bottles of it in 2022. For.Tè Rosé, from the 2024 harvest, is a still rosé from a disease-resistant Cabernet Sauvignon with a little Garganega: 2,000 bottles. There is also an extra virgin olive oil.
From the start the couple have worked with Indaco2, a team of researchers. Indaco2 measures the carbon footprint of every step, from the vineyard to the bottling line. That shapes their choices. The bottles are light glass and the stoppers are bio-based. Some of the newer vines are disease-resistant types, which need fewer sprays, and no chemical weedkiller is used. The estate says it is converting to organic farming and already sells the Riserva as an organic wine. The 2020 Riserva earned Four Vines in the AIS guide Vitae 2025. The 2019 won a Gran Medaglia d'Oro at the Città del Vino competition in 2023, with the Città del Bio special prize. Ca’ Avignone belongs to the Colli Euganei wine consortium, the Strada del Vino Colli Euganei and the Campagna Amica farmers' network.
The visit on sale is a tasting, not a tour. In the wine room you hear the story of the estate and see the vineyards on a screen. Then four wines are poured with artisan bread, cured meats and cheese, and an extra glass of Argentinian wine. The tasting lasts an hour and a half and runs on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, in English or Italian. It is booked on Winedering at least two days ahead, for groups of two to twenty-five. The estate has also held summer dinners under its olive trees and poured at the Calici di Stelle festival in Arquà Petrarca. Parking is free and dogs are welcome.
Plate I · VENETO
Wine area
Volcanic hills south of Padua, sweet Moscato Fior d'Arancio.
Winery
Villa, Padova · Colli Euganei
1 tasting, checked by our editors. From €25.
Tasting
Taste a selection of 4 Ca' Avignone wines paired with local products
via Winedering
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Ca’ Avignone's current bottle selection is easiest to understand through Cabernet Sauvignon and Garganega.
This form reaches the ItalianWines.co.uk team, not the winery. Tell us when you would like to come and how many you are: we contact Ca’ Avignone for you and come back with availability and prices, usually within two working days.
Veneto
5 wines 
Tastings
Booking required
