2014 Sagrantino di Montefalco Spinning Beauty

Marco Caprai did amazing work softening the tannins of Sagrantino, creating a more approachable style while maintaining varietal character. Caprai and his team have mastered an elegant style that pleases a broad audience. While some wines, like Spinning Beauty, Rosso Riserva and 25 Anni, show aggressive oak when young, the integration over time is expertly done. An example of this transformation is the Sagrantino 25 Anni, which, approaching its tenth to fifteenth year in bottle, shows beautiful maturity. In my recent interview with Caprai, he explains that the 2020 Sagrantino underwent a two-week whole-berry fermentation for more delicate extractions. This process, refined in collaboration with Michel Rolland, involves a forty-day barrel-turning, which gently stirs the wine and fully exposes it to oak, giving rounder, smoother and more elegant wines. This process allowed Caprai to perform three hundred individual vinifications, providing flexibility in selecting the best wines for blending.
The Montefalco Sagrantino Collepiano, one of the region's best quality-to-price-ratio wines, is a perfect example. The tannins are sweet and round, yet the wine is perfectly balanced, and the oak is in no way obtrusive. The 2020 was a successful vintage for Caprai, demonstrating that the sleek and polished style complements the year's soft textures and aromatic complexities well. Despite their large-scale operation, Arnaldo Caprai’s quality remains remarkably high and consistent. The wines are available in many markets and offer a fantastic relative value across the board.