ABOUT BIODYNAMICS

Natural wine comes from vineyards that are cultivated using methods that reduce climate impacts to the minimum and benefit the biodiversity. We take this a step further as we are biodynamic. Biodynamics started with Rudolf Steiner in the early 1900’s. It has many entry points and levels of practice. We have chosen to take this route because we believe in the results. We see it in the soil, and in the microorganism that meet us.

How did it all start? When did we encounter biodynamics?

One day, we went to the Steinerhögskolan - Steiner University College -  in Järna, Sweden close to Stockholm. We went primarily to see the James Turrell ‘Sky Space’ installation but for sure the following experience was something that took us down to earth. In the cantina of the college, we went to have lunch. We were served the most delicious salad. For both of us, this taste was a revelation. Morten explained that the taste was a time transporting device to his grandmother’s kitchen garden when he was a child. Could salad really taste so good? We have forgotten it in the times of mass-produced salad from the supermarket.

The Steiner salad had so many ingredients and taste sensations that stemmed from the soil, and the care given to it. So we started to look for other biodynamic products in general, which led us to biodynamic vineyards and consequently to drink only biodynamic wine, And we both noticed, that this wine both tasted better and had no side-effects. No headache, no hangover. What was going on here?

On these visits to the vineyards, we met Beppe (Giuseppe) who we now consider our mentor. He opene a door into a way of thinking, not dogmatic and rhetoric, but rather more like an all-encompassing worldview that specifically for us had to do with the treatment of the soil, the organisms, and of all lifeworlds. Biodynamics for us is not only a farming practice, but also a philosophy and a way of being.

Natural biodynamic wine is not a modified wine. Once you have drank natural wines, with time, it is difficult to drink other wines. To drink natural wine is a choice. It is a choice that signals many thresholds: care, pluriverse, a cause, a vision, a movement, wellbeing, ecosystem, curiosity, a catalyst. It is a discussion that is vivid and gives way to conversation, to debate, to learn something, and to become aware.

With biodynamic wine-making we respect the equilibrium and natural cycles of the nature. We only use a minimum amount of copper and sulphate in the necessary period and after heavy rains in order to minimize damage from mildew or other fungal forms that come with humidity. We have a minimum cutting of grass, only at certain heights to avoid the spread of mildew during humid seasons, and to avoid fires during extreme heat waves. In the fall, we seed legume cover crops, and in the spring we plant a variety of flowers for our bees and for the wines. We use natural fertilizers containing mycorrhizae which we determine together with our enolog Pietro. We invite butterflies, bees, wasps, ladybugs and other insects in the cover beds where wild flowers are welcomed. Wild chicory, phacelia, red and white clover, poppies, erba medica ‘lucerne alfalfa’, wild mint ‘nepitella’ and so forth. Each herb, grass, wildflower, has a function in the wine making. It has its own role, nutrition to give which it exchanges with the soil via its root system. As do all the organisms inside the soil. All this life around the vines participates with us in the act of making wine.

In our journey we have encountered many winemakers, and the most interesting of them have been biodynamic. A wonderful mix of philosophers, anarchists, poets and outlaws. They make you think. For sure it is in biodynamics that you find persons with knowledge, courage and passion for the wine they make. Just taste it and you will also understand the difference.