From the atlas
Castelveder
At A Glance
| |
| Location | Monticelli Brusati, Franciacorta DOCG, Lombardy |
| Founded | 1975 |
| Founders | Renato Alberti and Elena Nulli |
| Current generation | Camilla and Francesco Alberti (third generation) |
| Grapes | Chardonnay, Pinot Bianco, Pinot Nero |
| Style | Traditional-method sparkling wine (Franciacorta DOCG) |
| Vineyards | Eight named parcels, 300 to 380 metres, clay and marl soils |
| Production | Roughly 60,000 to 70,000 bottles annually |
| Farming | Integrated winemaking (Franciacorta consortium classification) |
The Producer
In 1975, Renato Alberti and Elena Nulli drove to the hills above Monticelli Brusati and started planting. There was no inherited estate, no family tradition already in motion. They chose a slope and a grape focus, and staked a family future on both. Fifty years on, the winery they built is run by their grandchildren Camilla and Francesco, from the same hillside location and in the same appellation: Franciacorta DOCG, Lombardy's traditional-method sparkling wine zone.
Castelveder makes only Franciacorta. The bottles are sparkling wines produced by secondary fermentation in the bottle, from Chardonnay, Pinot Bianco, and Pinot Nero grown on eight named vineyard parcels the family has mapped and farmed across those original slopes. The range runs from a non-vintage Brut to a Riserva that spends a minimum of five years on its lees before release.
Place
Franciacorta is a DOCG zone in the province of Brescia, set between Lake Iseo and the city of Brescia in Lombardy. The appellation covers only traditional-method sparkling wine made from Chardonnay, Pinot Bianco, and Pinot Nero, and the label category sits above Prosecco and close to Champagne in its production requirements. Monticelli Brusati is one of the villages within the zone, and Castelveder's vineyards sit exclusively on its hills.
The elevation here, between 300 and 380 metres, matters for how the grapes ripen. Higher than the flat moraine floor of the broader zone, the parcels accumulate slightly cooler nights, which extends the growing season and keeps acidity alive in the fruit.
Soil And Site
The soils across the eight Castelveder parcels are a mixture of clay and marl, laid down in the glacial moraine deposits that define the Franciacorta subsoil. Clay retains water and moderates vine stress in drier summers. Marl adds calcium carbonate, which contributes to the mineral character that runs through the Chardonnay-based wines in particular.
Two parcels have confirmed details. The Castellotto parcel covers one hectare of loamy clay at 300 metres, planted entirely to Chardonnay. The Madonna della Rosa parcel is half a hectare of clayey loam at 380 metres, planted to Pinot Bianco. The remaining six named blocks, Palazzina, Cilinder, Nulli, Guast, Posta, and Ronchetto, complete the estate, which official sources put at between 10 and 11 hectares in total. All parcels are trained on Guyot, the single-cane system that limits yield per vine and keeps the canopy manageable on hillside ground.
Story
Renato Alberti and Elena Nulli were not winemakers by training. They were a couple with a conviction about a particular set of hills in Monticelli Brusati, a conviction strong enough to plant vines and build a cellar from scratch in 1975. The Franciacorta DOCG was still being defined in those years: the appellation's first recognition as a DOC for sparkling wine had come only in 1967, and the stricter DOCG designation would not arrive until 1995. Renato and Elena were planting into an emerging appellation, not an established one.
Their decision to grow and vinify their own fruit rather than purchase grapes fixed the estate's character early. They mapped the eight parcels, assigned varieties to soil types, and built a cellar designed for slow bottle fermentation and extended lees contact. The third generation, grandchildren Camilla and Francesco, now leads the winery. No change in location, no change in appellation focus, no change in the reliance on estate-grown fruit from Monticelli Brusati. What has shifted is scale and procedural confidence, reflected in a range that now extends from entry-level Brut to a Riserva programme that commits bottles to the cellar for five years before any are released.
Vineyards And Cellar
Harvest is done by hand, with pickers filling plastic crates that are transported to the cellar on carts. Whole bunches go directly to the press, where gentle pressing extracts juice without breaking seeds or crushing stems, keeping tannin and bitterness out of the base wine. That care at harvest is what gives the Chardonnay-based Brut its clean fruit and pale straw colour.
In the spring following harvest, the base wine is prepared for tirage: sugar and selected yeasts are added to each bottle to initiate a second fermentation. The sealed bottles are then stacked horizontally in cool, dark cellars, where the secondary fermentation takes place and the wine rests on the dead yeast cells, the lees. Minimum lees contact is 18 months for non-vintage Brut; 24 months for Rosé and Satèn; 30 months for Millesimato; 60 months for Riserva.
Riddling follows: bottles are placed on specialised racks and rotated by one-eighth of a turn daily for approximately 20 days, tilting progressively until they are neck-down, sediment collected at the cap. Disgorgement then removes the accumulated yeast plug and the wine is dosed and sealed. The Franciacorta consortium classifies Castelveder's farming approach as integrated winemaking.
Wines
The range is built around the five statutory Franciacorta DOCG categories, each with its own lees-ageing minimum and distinct character.
The Franciacorta Brut is Chardonnay-based, with a minimum of 18 months on lees. The colour is pale straw, the perlage fine and persistent. Bread and white flower aromas lead, followed by vanilla. The mousse is light, the finish clean.
The Franciacorta Brut Rosé is made from Pinot Nero, giving it rosé colour derived from the variety rather than from blending. The aromatic profile shifts considerably: white flower, fresh apple, red fruit, mineral chalk, and citrus zest, with a freshness the Chardonnay-led wines do not carry in the same way. Minimum lees contact is 24 months.
The Franciacorta Satèn also requires a minimum of 24 months on lees. Satèn is a lower-pressure style within the Franciacorta category, producing a creamier, softer mousse with more body and less aggressive carbonation than a standard Brut.
The Franciacorta Millesimato is vintage-dated, made only in years the family judges to be worth the commitment, with a minimum of 30 months on lees. The extra time shows in depth and integration.
The Franciacorta Riserva is the long end of the range: a minimum of 60 months on lees, meaning the wine spends at least five years in the cellar before any bottle is sold. At that level of ageing, secondary aromas from yeast autolysis, brioche, dried flowers, and a waxy texture come to dominate over the primary fruit.
In The Glass
The Brut opens with bread and white blossom, a combination that comes directly from extended lees contact on Chardonnay. The perlage rises finely and consistently. In the mouth, the wine is smooth and persistent, with soft apple and pear fruit, a gentle acid line across the mid-palate, and a dry finish without sweetness or weight. It is a wine built for the table rather than for sipping in isolation.
The Brut Rosé reads differently from the first pour. The Pinot Nero gives the colour a salmon-pink tone and the aromatics a distinct red-fruit register: raspberry, red apple, and dried rose petal over a base of chalk and citrus. The mousse is equally fine but the palate carries more presence, with the fruit holding longer into the finish and the acidity cutting more noticeably against it.
At the Riserva level, the primary fruit recedes and the wine expresses what five years of lees contact produces: toasted bread, hazelnut, dried apricot, and a lanolin-like texture that coats the mid-palate. The acidity remains, but it is woven in rather than sitting on top.
A Bottle To Understand It
Start with the Castelveder Franciacorta Brut. It is the estate's Chardonnay-based non-vintage wine, aged a minimum of 18 months on lees, and it does the clearest job of placing Castelveder within Franciacorta as a category: traditional-method sparkling wine from a hillside estate, made with more time in the cellar than the method legally requires at entry level, and without the dosage-driven sweetness that marks cheaper sparkling wine in the same price range. The pale straw colour, fine persistent perlage, and dry finish are what Franciacorta promises. The bread and white flower aromas that rise from 18 months of lees contact are what Castelveder adds. For a first bottle, it is unambiguous in its style and its address.
Anecdote
The cellar is carved into the white majolica of the land. Each spring after harvest, the base wine is prepared for tirage with sugar and selected yeasts, initiating a second fermentation. At refermentation, the pressure is five atmospheres for Satèn and 6.5 for Brut. The bottles are stacked horizontally in cool, dark conditions and remain on their lees for at least 18 months. During riddling, each bottle is rotated by one eighth of a turn daily for about 20 days until the sediment collects at the cap for disgorgement.
Final Word
Castelveder is a hillside Franciacorta estate with one founding conviction, one village, and three generations of the same family working from the same parcels. The bottles are traditional-method sparkling wines made with genuine cellar patience, from Chardonnay, Pinot Bianco, and Pinot Nero grown on clay and marl soils between 300 and 380 metres. The Brut is the clear entry point; the Riserva is where the commitment to time in the cellar becomes most legible in the glass.
Sources
- https://www.castelveder.it/en/the-story/
- https://www.castelveder.it/en/the-castelveder-vineyards/
- https://www.castelveder.it/en/the-franciacorta-method/
- https://franciacorta.wine/en/wineries/castelveder/
- https://www.castelveder.it/en/prodotto/castelveder-franciacorta-brut/
- https://www.castelveder.it/en/prodotto/castelveder-franciacorta-brut-rose/