Brunello di Montalcino Cielo Magnum

From the 2016 vintage on, Stella di Campalto stopped making a single Brunello. She picks and vinifies each parcel at Podere San Giuseppe on its own, then puts them together into what she calls masse, groups of vineyards chosen to show different sides of the same year. In 2018 there were three: Cielo, Bosco and Aria.

Cielo means sky. The US importer North Berkeley Imports names two south-facing parcels in the 2018: the stretch of Vigna Curva that runs along the wood, and Vigna Leccio. The grapes are picked by hand, fall by gravity into upright wooden vats, and ferment on their own yeasts with nothing added but a minimal dose of sulphur.

Of the three 2018s, Cielo had the shortest road. It spent 31 months in cask, against 32 for Bosco and 34 for Aria, and was held for at least 20 months in bottle, where the other two waited at least 34 and 42. It went to bottle unfined and unfiltered. Stella named the vintage L'ariosità, airiness, and calls it a mellifluous, airy year.

This is the large format of the standard bottle: 1,400 magnums were filled next to 7,225 bottles of 750 ml.