Olek Bondonio - Barbaresco Roncagliette 2020

Add to Wish List

Organic, some biodynamic practices. 100% Nebbiolo from Roncagliette: 50 year-old vines, planted on very heavy clay on top of blue marl, 350m elevation. Fermented in concrete with two months on the skins (submerged cap), then pressed off and moved to large botti for longer élevage (usually two years). Unfined, unfiltered, with moderate amounts of SO2 (10-20ppm max) added just before bottling. This is the powerhouse wine of the domaine, with a palate saturated in black fruit and a highly mineral core, but it never loses its sense of freshness or drinkability.

Olek Bondonio Description

It’s an understatement to say that Bondonio is pretty different than much of the viticultural scene in the Piedmont, especially in the town of Barbaresco—no tasting room, no elaborate metal sculptures at the gates, no name emblazoned on the facility. Instead, he makes wines and lives at his family’s 200 year-old farmhouse called ‘La Berchialla,’ where old rural custom has new life breathed in: his botti for aging live in the bottom floor where cattle used to be kept; the family lived on the floor above. There is a surprising pedigree here, however: Bondonio’s wines hail from three lauded vineyards, some of which have been in his family those same 200 years. (One of Olek’s ancestors from La Berchialla, General Guglielmo Como, was a key founder of ‘Barbaresco’s Corporate Wine Cellar,’ today known as ‘Produttori del Barbaresco.’)

Despite Bondonio’s ancestry and highly-regarded vines—including his holding of Roncagliette, just down his driveway, immediately abutting Gaja’s famous Sorì Tildin—Olek only began his foray into wine with encouragement from his Polish mother, who told him if he was interested in making wine off the family vineyards, he should do it. This encouragement contrasted the bullish attitude of Bondonio’s male forebears—‘there’s no way you can do this’—who were lawyers by trade and accustomed to selling their storied fruit for many years. Bondonio began first to tend the family vines, getting to know the character of each vineyard for a few years before taking a stab at wine itself, then undertook his first small vintage in 2005.

After 15 years and more laboring at the wines, Bondonio’s distinctive practices are clear: a committed believer in no chemical inputs in the vines, with some biodynamic practices applied, very minimal intervention in the cellar.