The History
The road winding its way past castles and vineyards of great wines in the hills of the Langhe leads to Fontanafredda, the winery at the heart of wine-growing Piedmont that King Victor Emmanuel II set his mind on in 1858. In fact, “by order of 17 June 1858” an area of 138.82 “giornate piemontesi” (around 54 hectares) was registered to the private estate of the King of Sardinia from a property belonging to “Giacomo Roggeri son of Gioanni Battista in Serralunga d’Alba”. Subsequently, on 20 January 1860 the entire estate was made over to “Count Emanuele Guerrieri and his sister Maria Vittoria”, the natural children of the King and Rosa
Vercellana, who had herself been made Countess of Mirafiori and Fontanafredda the year before (1859).
The history of Fontanafredda had begun, but it did not start operating as a business venture until twenty years later (in 1878, the year of the King’s death), when the noble entrepreneurial figure of Emanuele Guerrieri, Count of Mirafiore began to dedicate himself to wine with passion and far-sightedness. Following a thoroughly modern approach, he immediately implemented innovative criteria designed to produce wines of quality, in particular Barolo.
The estate’s noble past is still evident today in the hunting lodge, hamlet, extensive cellars and vineyards, but the company continues to experiment and move with the times in perfecting what nature and history have handed down. And in the Langhe, where the landscape is marked by the vines and wines that have linked generations down the years, this is why Fontanafredda continues to stand out as a focal point: the expression of a wine culture that stems from the land and the vineyard, and matures through the work and creativity of man.