Chiara Condello

📸 Fotograf Anna Sigge

We meet up with Chiara and Anna from the wine import company Terrific Wines at an Italian restaurant in Gothenburg. It just happens to be an Italian restaurant and I think for my self that it should have been more innovative. Above all, more Swedish... Well, we can hope for more visits from Chiara in Sweden in the future...

Chiara starts with answer probably the most common question she gets, how it all started:

"I was told that a neighbor wanted to tear up his old vines because they were not considered productive enough. Which you can say was the real starting shot"

But we take it from the beginning...

It all really started when Chiara as a child ran around in Grandpa's vineyard. "I grew up with my grandparents and lived with them until I was 14," says Chiara. With warmth in her voice, she describes her grandfather and how he taught her everything about agriculture.

"I lived their lives, I learned the respect for cultivating the land from my grandfather"

A respect that Chiara has refined over the years and that permeates the work in her own vineyard, also located in Predappio in southeastern Emilia-Romagna. Chiara then studied economics in Milan and spent a number of years abroad. For example; Australia, Belgium and Singapore. After her degree in "international management", she moved back to her family and Condé for a couple of months, waiting to start her intended job for a consulting company.

”I found myself to love being there. Two months turned into a summer and eventually even over the 2012 harvest"

In 2015, when Chiara was still working for her parents, it came to her notice that a close neighbor wanted to tear all his vines up. Chiara thought it was an incredible pity to lose the old vines and asked if she could take them over, which they were just happy about. The old owners got rid of the job of pulling them up and Chiara was able to take over old vines in a superb vineyard location.

This is how Chiara found the place Predappio, where she has been running a winery under her own name since 2015. Chiara Condello is a 4.8 hectare domain, divided into four different plots located at 150 to 360 meters altitude.

Le Lucciole, one of the plotters is a so-called "single vineyard" consisting of stone soil, whose grapes goes to the wine of the same name. The other three plots, consisting of clay soil, are combined in one and the same wine; Chiara Condello.

"I follow the place when I make wine, although of course I help to keep the wines on track"

Today she is also the responsible winemaker at Condé. ”But there we are a larger team and we also work with a consultant. At my own winery, it's mostly just me.”

Chiara grows only sangiovese on her property, and that is the native variety; sangiovese piccolo. The grape is characterized by having smaller bunches and smaller berries with thicker skins than for example the sangiovese grown in Tuscany.

Chiara talks about the importance of keeping the skins of the grapes protected and preserved, which allows a longer maceration during vinification. This and much more we will learn about in the future when Chiara returns in early 2022.

A very warm welcome to Chiara Condello!