From the atlas
Fattoria Selvapiana
At A Glance
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| Location | Rufina, northeastern Tuscany |
| Appellation | Chianti Rufina DOCG |
| Grape | Sangiovese |
| Estate | 250 hectares; approximately 58 hectares under vine |
| Flagship | Vigneto Bucerchiale Riserva |
| Farming | Certified organic |
| In charge | Federico and Silvia Giuntini Masseti (since 1997) |
The Producer
Selvapiana sits at the foot of the Apennines in the Rufina valley, roughly 25 kilometres northeast of Florence. It has belonged to one family since 1827, when Michele Giuntini, a Florentine banker, acquired what had been a medieval defensive watchtower and gradually expanded it into a working estate. The property now stretches across 250 hectares in three municipalities: Rufina, Pontassieve, and Pelago, with about 58 hectares planted to vines and another 140 under woodland.
Francesco Giuntini ran the estate from 1957 to 1997. His tenure included the 1979 Bucerchiale debut and a succession arrangement that placed the estate in the hands of Federico and Silvia Giuntini Masseti, his adopted children. Federico and Silvia are the son and daughter of Franco Masseti, who served as estate manager from 1953 to 1990, giving the handover a quality of earned continuity rather than formal inheritance. Federico now handles the vineyards and winemaking; Silvia oversees the office.
Place
Chianti Rufina is a small sub-zone of the Chianti appellation: geographically distinct, climatically cooler, and consistently overshadowed in the market by Chianti Classico to the south. The distinction is real and matters in the glass. Rufina sits higher, in a valley cut by the Sieve river and backed by the Apennines. The mountains give the vineyards longer days in summer, colder nights, and a growing season that extends later into autumn than in the warmer Classico zone. That extra hang time builds concentration in the Sangiovese without sacrificing the acidity that defines the grape's character in cool conditions.
On the label, Chianti Rufina qualifies as its own DOCG, separate from Chianti Classico. Wines labelled Riserva must meet additional ageing requirements. Selvapiana's single-vineyard designation, Vigneto Bucerchiale, sits within that Riserva category and names the specific parcel on the bottle.
Soil And Site
Selvapiana's vineyards lie on the Apennine foothills east of Florence. The terrain is hilly rather than dramatically steep, and the vine parcels face south and southwest, maximising sun exposure in a valley where temperatures drop sharply after harvest. The soils are clay-rich with galestro, the schist-like, friable rock common across Tuscany's better Sangiovese country. Galestro drains freely and warms quickly in spring, favouring vine balance: enough water retention to avoid summer stress, enough drainage to keep roots searching deep. The Bucerchiale parcel contains vines planted in 1968 and 1992, giving the wine a mix of older vine depth and younger vine freshness.
Story
When Michele Giuntini took over a disused watchtower on the Sieve in 1827, the land produced the kind of mixed agriculture common to Tuscan estates of the period: grapes, olives, and woodland, all managed together. The wine that left the property was blended and sold in bulk, as most Tuscan wine was. That remained the shape of the estate through the nineteenth century and into the twentieth.
Francesco Giuntini's forty-year tenure included work on Sangiovese. He arrived in 1957 and, working alongside his collaborator Francesco Paolicchi, began thinking about Sangiovese differently. In 1979 they produced the first Chianti Rufina Riserva Vigneto Bucerchiale, a wine labelled with the name of a single vineyard and made entirely from Sangiovese. Single-vineyard labelling was not standard practice in Rufina at that time. Producing a Riserva from one parcel and one grape, under a named-vineyard designation, was a decision ahead of the appellation's general direction.
Federico Giuntini Masseti took over from Francesco in 1997 and carried the organic commitment he had begun a decade earlier into full estate practice. The cellar approach has remained stable: moderate oak, long enough ageing to develop the wine, and no attempt to soften Sangiovese's tannin or brighten its acidity beyond what the vintage gives.
Vineyards And Cellar
Organic farming at Selvapiana covers both the vineyards and the olive groves. Federico began converting selected parcels in the summer of 1987 and extended the method across the whole estate once the first plots showed the approach was sound. Certified organic status now applies to all vine and olive cultivation.
In the cellar, Bucerchiale follows a traditional Rufina line. The 2022 vintage was aged for 15 months in medium-sized oak casks and French oak barriques, with 10 per cent new wood. That proportion of new oak is deliberately low: it rounds the tannin without imposing vanilla or toast character, leaving the fruit and acidity of Sangiovese to do the work. The wine is not filtered or treated to accelerate softening. What goes into the bottle reflects what the parcel produced that year.
Wines
The range follows the Chianti Rufina hierarchy from the ground up. Entry-level Chianti Rufina is a Sangiovese-dominant blend made for earlier drinking: lighter extraction, shorter oak contact, and fruit that is accessible in the first two to four years. It carries the appetising cherry and herb character typical of cool-grown Sangiovese, with enough acidity to work well at the table.
The Riserva tier raises the oak ageing and selection standard. The wine comes from older parcels, spends longer in wood, and builds more tannic depth. It has the acid backbone to develop over a decade.
Vigneto Bucerchiale Riserva is the estate's defining wine. Drawn from Sangiovese on parcels planted in 1968 and 1992, it adds the specificity of a named site to the Riserva framework. The older 1968 vines give low yield and concentrated fruit; the 1992 parcels contribute freshness and aromatic lift. Together they produce a wine with dark cherry and plum concentration, a graphite and tobacco leaf quality in the mid-palate, firm but integrated tannin, and the long acid finish that separates Rufina from warmer Chianti sub-zones.
In The Glass
Across the range, the signature is Sangiovese shaped by cool altitude: red and dark cherry, a floral note in younger vintages, firm acidity that runs through the mid-palate and anchors the finish. The entry Chianti Rufina is the most open-knit, with high-toned red fruit and a clean, herb-edged close.
Bucerchiale shows a different register. It opens with dark cherry and ripe plum rather than the lighter red fruit of the base wine, deepened by graphite and tobacco leaf from the older vines and the 15-month oak ageing. In the mouth, the tannin is present from the first sip, grippy and fine-grained rather than coarse. The acidity lifts through the mid-palate and keeps the finish long and savoury. Oak is present but not dominant: the wood rounds the tannin without adding sweetness or toast. Expect the wine to open over at least a decade from a good vintage.
A Bottle To Understand It
Chianti Rufina Riserva Vigneto Bucerchiale is the bottle to begin with. It is a single-parcel Sangiovese Riserva aged in medium-sized casks with restrained new oak, and it carries the two things that make Rufina worth understanding: the concentrated dark fruit that comes from Apennine-foot vines with genuine age, and the bright, mouthwatering acidity that keeps the wine from ever feeling heavy. The tannin is firm and requires two to three years of bottle age from release, but once it settles, the dark cherry, graphite, and tobacco character integrates into a long, dry, savoury finish. It is not a polished or easy-drinking wine. It is specific, cool-climate Sangiovese from parcels that have been producing serious fruit since 1968.
Anecdote
Federico Giuntini Masseti finished high school in the summer of 1987 and went straight to Selvapiana. He was not yet in charge: Francesco Giuntini still ran the estate. But Federico arrived with a request. He wanted to begin converting some of the vineyards to organic farming. Francesco agreed. They chose two parcels and started there. Those plots became the proof: once the method held through a full cycle, the rest of the estate followed. By the time Federico and Silvia formally took over in 1997, the organic certification already covered both the vineyards and the olive groves. An eighteen-year-old's first-summer request had become the foundation of the estate's entire agricultural approach, and it has remained in place ever since.
Final Word
Selvapiana is the clearest argument Chianti Rufina makes for itself: a single family, a single sub-zone, a single grape, and a single parcel that has been named on the bottle since 1979. Rufina does not have the market presence of Classico, but Bucerchiale has the track record and the acidity to age as well as most of Tuscany. Federico Giuntini Masseti tends vineyards that were planted before he was born, using farming methods he asked for as a teenager. The wine is the record of both.
Sources
- https://www.chiantirufina.com/en/produttori-chianti-rufina/fattoria-selvapiana/
- https://www.selvapiana.it/john-fodera-features-fattoria-selvapiana-in-a-piece-for-tuscan-vines/
- https://www.libertywines.co.uk/our-portfolio/SE403-selvapiana-vigneto-bucerchiale-chianti-rufina-riserva
- https://www.b-21.com/2022-Selvapiana-Bucerchiale-Chianti-Rufina-Riserva/productinfo/ITSECH22BE/