Paolo Scavino

At A Glance

Producer: Paolo Scavino Village: Castiglione Falletto Appellation: Barolo DOCG Region: Piedmont, Italy Grapes: Nebbiolo, Barbera, Dolcetto Generation: Fourth (Elisa and Enrica Scavino) Hectares: 30, across 20 plots

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The Producer

Paolo Scavino farms Barolo the way a geologist maps a hillside: plot by plot, argument by argument. The estate sits in Castiglione Falletto, the central village of the Barolo zone, and draws from 30 hectares divided among 20 separate parcels across eight communes. Each plot is vinified on its own, and some are split further into multiple fermentations when soil composition, altitude, vine age or clone differences justify it.

The estate was founded in 1921 by Lorenzo Scavino and his son Paolo. Lorenzo's grandson Enrico joined the farm at the age of ten in 1951, when the holding still raised animals and grew fruit and grain alongside its vines. Enrico would spend the next seven decades shaping how the family understood and bottled Barolo. He died in 2024. His daughters Elisa and Enrica, the fourth generation, now run the estate.

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Place

Castiglione Falletto sits at the heart of the Barolo zone, between La Morra to the northwest and Serralunga d'Alba to the southeast. The village appellation sits on soils with a higher proportion of Helvetian limestone and compact Tortonian marls. Its Nebbiolo runs firmer and more tannic than the fleshier wines from La Morra's Tortonian-dominated hillsides.

Paolo Scavino does not stay within Castiglione Falletto alone. Its 20 plots reach into seven additional communes: Barolo, La Morra, Novello, Serralunga d'Alba, Verduno, Roddi and Monforte d'Alba. Each commune brings its own geology and aspect. Serralunga's iron-rich, compact Helvetian soils push toward long-lived, muscular Nebbiolo. La Morra's softer, rounder Tortonian beds give earlier-drinking wines with more immediate fruit. The estate's spread across this geography is deliberate: the range maps the variation that the Barolo DOCG contains within its boundaries.

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Soil And Site

Castiglione Falletto's vineyards sit on compact, calcareous marl with a Helvetian-era limestone component, and the commune's Nebbiolo has firmer tannic architecture. Further across the estate's spread, Novello's Ravera parcel climbs to 430 metres on an east-facing slope, where morning sun and cooler overnight temperatures slow ripening and preserve acidity in the grape. Serralunga's iron-rich compacted soils at the southeastern edge of the zone are among the most demanding in Barolo, producing wines that need considerable time to open.

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Story

When Enrico Scavino joined the farm in 1951, the holding ran animals alongside vines and sold most of its wine in bulk. The family's path from mixed farm to single-vineyard Barolo producer was not rapid, but each generation moved in one direction: toward the individual plot as the unit of quality.

The decisive step came in 1978. Enrico went to his father Paolo and proposed bottling the wine from their Bric del Fiasc parcel under its own label rather than blending it into the estate wine. Paolo agreed. That bottle, the family's first cru Barolo, became the flagship it remains today, and every single-plot wine in the range follows the logic Enrico established in that conversation.

Under Elisa and Enrica, the fourth generation has turned the cellar back toward more traditional methods: larger Slavonian oak vessels, manual pumpovers and punchdowns in place of the roto-fermenters Enrico once experimented with. The range architecture holds, but the cellar approach reflects a renewed confidence in Nebbiolo's capacity to speak without being accelerated.

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Vineyards And Cellar

The farming is not certified organic. Elisa Scavino uses natural products selectively, guided by accumulated vineyard knowledge rather than a formal program. Yields are deliberately low, and during the first year of ageing, the estate reviews each plot's wine and sells underperforming parcels in bulk rather than diluting the label with weaker material.

In the cellar, each cru and sub-cru ferments separately in stainless steel tanks with native yeasts. Maceration runs eight to twelve days, followed by twenty to thirty days of alcoholic fermentation. The maturation sequence for non-riserva Barolo moves through ten months in neutral French oak barrels, twelve months in large oak casks, ten months back in stainless steel, and ten months in bottle before release. The combination of vessel types and extended ageing lets Nebbiolo's tannins soften without losing their grip, while the return to stainless steel before bottling preserves freshness in the finished wine.

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Wines

The everyday tier covers Dolcetto d'Alba and Barbera d'Alba, grown from the same 30 hectares that feed the Barolo range. Dolcetto gives soft, low-acid, early-drinking red wine with dark fruit and round tannins. Barbera, which lacks the grip of Nebbiolo but has high natural acidity, gives brighter, juicier wine suited to younger drinking.

The Barolo range is built from single-plot vinifications drawn from the eight communes. Bric del Fiasc, the estate's oldest cru bottling, comes from Castiglione Falletto. It is a wine of considerable depth, with the dark fruit, tar-edged tannins and firm acid line typical of the commune, and it has been described in recent vintages as showing dark cherry, graphite and dried violet with a long, structured finish. Ravera comes from Novello, from an east-facing parcel at 430 metres. The altitude and aspect moderate ripeness, and the wine carries lifted red fruit, firmer acidity and a more mineral quality than many Castiglione Falletto bottlings. Across the other crus, the estate follows the same protocol: separate vinification, active plot selection, and a long vessel-cycling maturation.

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In The Glass

Paolo Scavino Barolo is Nebbiolo at a measured pace. The wines rise from the glass with dried rose, tar, cherry and a faint graphite note that Castiglione Falletto's limestone-driven soils contribute to the grape. In the mouth, the tannins are firm and evenly distributed, never rasping, because the long maturation cycle softens them while the brief stainless steel phase before bottling keeps acidity present and alive. The mid-palate on wines from Castiglione Falletto tends toward dark fruit and earth, with a savoury finish that lingers. Ravera from Novello reads lighter in colour and tighter on opening, with redder fruit, a more obvious mineral note, and the fresh acidity that the east-facing altitude delivers. Both need time in the glass or in the cellar; young bottles benefit from at least an hour of air.

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A Bottle To Understand It

Start with the Barolo Ravera. The 2022 comes from a single east-facing Nebbiolo parcel at 430 metres in Novello, fermented with native yeasts in stainless steel and matured through the estate's full vessel sequence before release. In the glass it gives lifted red cherry and dried rose with a mineral thread running beneath, firm but fine tannins that frame a mid-palate of concentrated fruit, and a finish with enough acidity to feel long and clean. It is less tannic and more immediately approachable than Bric del Fiasc, which makes it the cleaner entry point into how the estate thinks: one parcel, vinified alone, shaped by place rather than by blending. Decant for an hour and it opens fully.

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Anecdote

In 1978, Enrico Scavino went to his father Paolo with a proposal: bottle the wine from their Bric del Fiasc parcel on its own rather than blending it into the estate Barolo. Paolo Scavino had been farming Castiglione Falletto since 1921, and selling the land's wine blended was the norm. The idea of labelling one plot separately, under its own name and with its own commercial life, was not how Barolo had typically been traded. Enrico made the case. Paolo agreed. The wine was bottled that year under the Bric del Fiasc name for the first time. It became the estate's flagship and has remained so for nearly five decades. Every single-cru Barolo Paolo Scavino now produces traces its logic back to that conversation between father and son in Castiglione Falletto.

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Final Word

Paolo Scavino is a fourth-generation family estate with 30 hectares spread across the Barolo zone's most varied geography. The wines are shaped by a commitment to individual plots over blended house style, and a cellar method that cycles through multiple vessel types to let Nebbiolo soften without losing its character. Bric del Fiasc is the historic flagship; Ravera is where to start.

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At A Glance

The Producer

Place

Soil And Site

Story

Vineyards And Cellar

Wines

In The Glass

A Bottle To Understand It

Anecdote

Final Word

Sources

Where to go next