The Family
The land and the vineyards have been part of my family history since the time of my grandfather. A destiny shared by many here in Valpolicella: the story of those who, when they wake up in the morning, first look out the window, to see what the weather is like and how the countryside is going.
We Ugolini are four brothers: me, Davide, Tiziano and Stefania. We were born and raised in Fumane, in the smallest valley of Valpolicella and – in my opinion – also the truest.
In 1996 our father, Angelo, passed away and I started taking care of the family vineyards. For me it was a love at first sight, even if all of us brothers have always believed in quality viticulture and shared the dream of making our grapes wine, while my father Angelo, like so many families in Valpolicella, simply collected and sold them. to other wine producers.
In 2010 we finally produced the first bottles of Valpolicella and Amarone with the name UGOLINI.
Over the years we have invested the savings of our work in the purchase of other hillside vineyards and above all of Villa San Michele, an ancient, panoramic rural courtyard at the foot of the San Michele hill, close to our winery. Since 2014 the Villa is the home of our wines and every wine lover is welcome: I am waiting for you!
Giambattista Ugolini
Our Project
A good wine can only come from healthy grapes, which are born and grow in an equally healthy environment. For this reason, from the beginning I have always paid the utmost attention to agronomic management in harmony with the natural rhythms and with the landscape: an approach that cannot arise by chance, but only from a careful study of the environment. A careful analysis of the soils led me to choose graft holders with tap roots for the new vines, to allow the plants to find a water and nutritional balance in soils rich in skeleton and composed mainly of compact marl. Not only that: to help the roots go deeper, the ancient practice of green manuring was adopted, which consists in sowing leguminous and cruciferous herbs along the rows of vines. These, having very large roots, able to go deep, open the way to the roots of the small vineyards. Furthermore, when these herbs bloom in spring, they are cut and buried to provide natural organic fertilizer to the vines themselves. A balanced environment has thus been created in the vineyard, and thanks to the elimination of all chemical products, even those species of birds that feed on insects and moths harmful to grapes have once again established themselves. This is why today it is so beautiful to walk among the vineyards, because it is easy to observe how much and what life is swarming there: the elimination of weeding has in fact allowed the return of many insects and birds useful for grapes that had almost disappeared in recent years. Protecting and enhancing biodiversity is not only good for the environment: it is also good for grapes and therefore for wine, because the environment in which a wine is born is part of its personality.