Denis Montanar
Borc Dodon, Italy (Friuli)
Denis Montanar farms in Borc Dodon, a tiny hamlet outside Villa Vicentina on the Aquileia plain — the flat stretch of southeastern Friuli between the Isonzo river and the Adriatic. The Montanar family has worked this land since 1904, growing grapes alongside spelt, wheat, and an ancient corn variety called Dente di Cavallo. Denis's grandparents used to open their farmhouse door to pour wine and slice salumi for neighbors — the old frasca tradition, hospitality before it had a business plan.
Denis took over his grandfather's vines in 1989 and made the farm fully organic by 1996, long before it was fashionable — he's considered one of Friuli's first natural winemakers, and some of his parcels, planted as far back as the 1910s, have never once seen herbicide. All new plantings come from massale selection of the hardiest old local vines. Today it's 10.5 hectares across three sites — one loamy, one sandy, one clay — all within a few kilometers of each other.
The grapes are southern Friuli's own: Friulano, Verduzzo, Refosco dal Peduncolo Rosso, plus Sauvignon, Pinot Bianco, Merlot, and Cabernet Franc. Everything ferments wild in open vats, macerates as long as it wants, and goes to bottle without fining or filtration — fresh wines from steel and cement, deeper ones from big old wood.
IMPORTED SELECTIONS
RW 381