In Memory of Leonildo Pieropan

BY IAN D'AGATA | APRIL 14, 2018

Simply put, there have been fewer better, nicer, more knowledgeable and more important people in the world of Italian wine than Leonildo (Nino) Pieropan. Words are truly incapable of expressing who Pieropan was and what he stood for: a beacon of world-class wines back in the 1970s when Italy’s white wines were mostly an afterthought, an absolute innovator, an intelligently critical voice of Soave’s coop-dominated world, a first-rate Amarone producer and, last but not least, one of the founding members of the all-important Federazione Italiana Vignaioli Indipendenti (or FIVI). Although Pieropan’s health had not been good for some time, the news of his passing came as an absolute shock to most everyone.