Castellare di Castellina - Tuscany, was born in 1968 from the consolidation of five farms. The gains for hectare of Castellare are very small, clearly below what the Docgs Chianti Classico regulations determine to be the maximum allowed. A good exposure to the sun, a good drain of the water, a mixed ground of calcareous marls, galestro and little clay give wines both red and white, which are very well structured, intense and proper for a long ageing in bottle.
A different bird chosen among the dying species is reproduced every year on the labels of Castellare, as a sign of the care towards the environment that drives the production of Castellare. In fact, the use of herbicides and pesticides is avoided as well as of any other kind of systemic chemical product. Hunting's prohibition, together with this kind of cultivation, has favoured the return of many species of local fauna once much more diffused in the area.
The big Rocca di Frassinello projectcame into being not from a great but from a small idea. A small idea because connected to the develop of Castellare, but a big project when happened the arrival of Domain Baron De Rothschild Lafite, making the first join venture between an italian and french producer. Like other Chianti estates Castellare di Castellina, which has belonged to Paolo Panerai for almost 30 years, at the end of the 90’s had to take account of the fact that in the Chianti Classico zone it had become very hard, almost impossible, to expand: there was a lack of high quality land and there were planning complications which required building permission even to plant a vineyard.
The traditional and natural outlet of Siena, and therefore Chianti Classico, has always been the Maremma. So for some years there had been a kind of pasture change from the Chianti hills towards the sea, to that land which had once been malaria country before the reclamation begun by the Grand Duke Leopoldo of Tuscany.
