The Cattaneo Adorno family is ancient Genoese traditions, in the old “scagno” the archives preserve since the Middle Ages, accounts and files referring to the farming of the family land.
A keen interest in wine production was shown in those ancient commercial papers, but above all in the one produced - with passion and care - in the Monferrato and Oltrepò Pavese properties.
It was therefore intriguing to also find counts and filze of the last century that spoke of vast expanses of vineyards, grapes and fine wines produced on the hills of the Genoese area.
To lern that thee Bosco grape - today at the base of many Ligurian wines - from the Bianco di Coronata to the Bianco delle Cinqueterre, had been selected in the family woods in the early nineteenth century, from a white mutation of the more rustic and resistant Barbera than the Bianchetta and the Vermentino.

Ancient map of the Villa Cambiaso estate

Detail of a leaf and in the background the vineyard of Villa Cambiaso

View of the vineyard on the hills of Morego

A prestigious past, the tangible proof of which is the presence in the Cantina del Castello di Gabiano of a few dozen bottles of dessert white wine from 1904, still excellent, some of which uncorked at Christmas or on other festive occasions.
Vineyards mostly managed by sharecropping, and which the rapid industrialization of the post-war Val Polcevera had led to the easier woodland cultivation.
The decision to restore this heritage to its original prestige matured in 2016, from an inspection of the properties on the hills of Morego, a green oasis next to the modern establishment of the Italian Institute of Technology.
The land is arranged in an amphitheater and facing south east, in the past covered by vineyards of Bianchetta, Vermentino and Bosco.
Not only the altitude and the exposure but also the geology of the ground covered with quartz and flaking slates, with the contours drawn by ancient dry stone walls now covered by vegetation, left no doubt about the promise of the place.
We therefore proceeded to plan the recovery of those lands for a cultivation consistent with tradition but allowing the use of modern technologies.

Precise and interesting survey of the ancient territory existed, that of Vinzoni, the cartographer of the Republic of Genoa, who already in 1761 accurately mapped the beautiful property of Lazzaro Cambiaso, not only indicating with precision farms and fields, but giving useful indications, still valid today on the position of fountains, rainwater collection tanks, arable land, orchards and vineyards.
In those lands a wine estate has been brought back to life, 7 hectares (for the moment) dedicated to produce the typical local wines: The Bianco di Coronata and the Vermentino, in a second monent the Bianchetta Genovese.
A well equipped cellar was installed in the Pedemonte to treat the precious grapes harvested with delicacy and respect and to safeguard aromas and flavors in their typicality and complexity.

Giacomo Cattaneo Adorno

Procedure for the planting of the new vineyard

Ancient document showing the index of farms and tenants of 1761

Quartz pebbles, basalts and slates found in the ground

The vineyards

The estate now cultivates 3.8 hectares of vineyards in Morego, and 3 in Serra Riccò, on the left bank of the Secca stream.
The Soils are very different from each other, in Morego, in the heart of the production area of the Bianco di Coronata, the vines are planted at an altitude of 150 meters, on an amphitheater facing south-east, open to the sea breezes.
The soils are sandy marls, of strong acidity, with quartz pebbles, basalts and outcropping slates.
The varieties planted are the Bosco, the Vermentino, divided into clones of Tuscan and Corsican origin, and the Albarola.
The soil of Serra Riccò is more clayey and denser in organic matter, also at 150 meters above sea level with South South West exposure.
To find the clones of true Genoese Bianchetta planted there, a difficult two-year reserch led to the scions in the old local vineyards, then entrusted to a nursery for reproduction, grafting and subsequent planting.

The vineyards

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