The Petterino cellar is tucked beneath a traditional house in the town of Gattinara itself. Two generations ago, the courtyard to the back of the small property would have been alive with the odd cow, pig and chickens (the chickens remain to this day as Marco likes them!) Grain and vegetables would have been stored here too. The cellar is just that: a series of tiny rooms, one storey underground, filled with old casks, some 40 years old and a few centenarians too. The room is so small that the casks had to be delivered in pieces and assembled once they had been carried down the steep stone steps. This really is a wine cellar as it used to be in the past.
The brothers Gian Carlo and Marco today own two hectares of land registered to make Gattinara DOCG and another third of a hectare (at the lowest elevations) from which they make a simple red wine for household consumption. Their parcels are in the Permolone, Castelli, and Guardie zones of the hill of Gattinara, with vines ranging from 40 to 70 years old. The elevation is around 270 m, and the vineyards have subtly different aspects but range only from southeast, full south, and southwest.
The family story reflects very much the history of the region. The grandparents ‘ generation worked the land and produced crops and food for themselves. If they had any to spare, they would sell it locally. Wine ‘was like water in those days’, everyone made some, says Gian Carlo. If you could, you would sell wine to the large merchant companies, such as Nervi, based only a couple of hundred metres away. Wine only began to be taken more seriously when the DOC arrived in 1967.
In the next generation, the father typically worked the land while the sons had jobs and lent a hand in their free time. But progressively, much of the land was abandoned and returned to woods. For the Petterino family, the traditional lifestyle continued until about 1975, when the current generation’s father stopped keeping animals but still grew maize and grapes. Matured wine was sold to the merchants who began to bottle it; previously, it was sold in demijohns for quick consumption.
The ’modern’ era began in 1982 when a local agricultural official tasted the Petterino wine and persuaded the then-young Petterino brothers to bottle their wine. Clearly, he was impressed. The brothers continued to tend their vineyards while taking jobs in a local factory which worked in wood. The next big step, from 2011, was to start to export to the USA, first to a restaurant and then through an importer. It was a very long way indeed from the courtyard of a traditional house in Gattinara to New York! In all this time, the brothers have never promoted the wine at wine fairs or travelled at all; rather, the world has come to their backstreet in Gattinara.
The winemaking here is straightforward. Stainless steel fermentation vessels, one of the few concessions to the contemporary world, were bought from 2011 on. The wine ferments in them without automated temperature control, rising to 30-34ºC at its peak. Maceration on the skins lasts for around 15 days with regular rack and return to manage the cap. The wine then rests for a year, with the malolactic fermentation happening typically when the weather warms up in the spring. After a year, the wine is moved to cask where it remains for a minimum of 24 months (the standard Gattinara) or 36 months (riserva). Some casks are then bottled. When there is demand for more wine, other casks of the same vintage will be bottled. But there is no hurry. For example, in March 2025, there was still some 2015 riserva in cask.
More than ten years ago, Gian Carlo and Marco’s mother asked the brothers, already of retirement age, why they continued to tend the land and make wine. The answer remains to this day. We inherited this tradition, this way of working practised by our grandparents and preceding generations. As a result, we do it out of passion for the land and wine production. And we love it when people, from near and far, tell us that they have enjoyed our wines. This is much more important than any other reward.
Wines
Petterino Gattinara
2002 | 2009 | 2010 | 2013
Petterino Gattinara Riserva
2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2012