Tenuta Santa Maria

Official documents from as early as the mid-1500s attest to the Bertani family heritage in the Valpolicella region. At the start of the last half of the 1800s, brothers Gaetano & Giovanni Battista Bertani set out to establish a new benchmark for excellence in their craft. Combining their deep respect for tradition and love of the land with commercial savvy and innovative drive in both the areas of production and cultivation, the brothers Bertani built an enterprise unique to the Veneto of their epoch. With a forward-looking spirit, they introduced revolutionary vine growing techniques developed by agronomist Jules Guyot, techniques to which Gaetano Bertani had been exposed during his years of political exile in France for his active role in the Italian Unification Movement against the Austrian Empire. The brothers Bertani became the first in the region to bottle and sell Veronese wines, such as Valpolicella Ripasso, Recioto and Soave on a larger scale. They steadily expanded their market to Great Britain, Germany and the United States, winning recognition through winemaking competitions, both national and international. Today, Gaetano Bertani, great-grandson of founding brother Gaetano, and his sons, Giovanni and Guglielmo, maintain the family tradition and philosophy. Now in its sixth generation, the Bertani enterprise continues in the tradition of one of the oldest winemaking families in Italy, with a firmly-established history of excellence and the expertise born of a tireless endeavor to blend passion and skill with the power of the past.

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