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Entrepreneur, art collector, and former investment banker Tullio Masoni has created the world’s smallest vineyard, covering about 200 square feet. It’s perched atop a 16th-century palace in the heart of Reggio Emilia, a city in northeastern Italy known as the birthplace of the Italian national flag and Parmesan cheese.
Masoni grows his grapes at Via Mari 10, which is also the name of his wine. Legend has it that the iconic general Giuseppe Garibaldi visited this house back in 1859.
How a Tiny Wine Operation Came to Be
Once upon a time, Tullio Masoni inherited a vineyard from his winemaker father in the countryside near Reggio Emilia. He wasn’t interested in continuing the family business and sold it, as reported by CNN.
Twenty years later, he regretted that decision and set out to create a “pocket-sized” vineyard. Each year, Masoni produces 29 bottles of red wine from the Via Mari 10 vineyard — all from a single harvest. Each bottle is priced at €5,000.
This wine, prized for its rarity, isn’t sold in stores. It’s available at the Bonioni Arte art gallery, just a few blocks from the palace.
Masoni describes the wine as “a form of artistic self-expression, a philosophical provocation, something to keep in your living room.” He says the idea is to give people something to talk about with friends — and to tell the story of the madman who planted a vineyard on his rooftop.
The Art of the Vine
Tullio Masoni fertilizes his vines with bananas, eggs, seaweed, and nightingale droppings. The vines’ “diet” also includes sounds from the surrounding city, which Masoni says enrich the grapes and gives them an edge over rural grapes that are grown in quiet.
The wine is aged in oak barrels that double as sculptures by local artist Lorenzo Menozzi. The labels were designed by comic artist Giuseppe Camuncoli.
With his new wine collection, Tullio Masoni encourages buyers never to open the bottles but to treat them as works of art.
He calls himself “the only winemaker in the world who says you shouldn’t drink his wine.”
This is how Masoni describes the wine in the glass: “With the first sip, you feel a great surprise, but within seconds, something awakens in your mouth and opens your mind to new sensations.” Most wine lovers, of course, will have to take the winemaker’s word for it.
