Ar.Pe.Pe. (Arturo Pelizzatti Perego)
Overview
Ar.Pe.Pe. is one of the great Italian wine estates and the benchmark producer of Valtellina Superiore. The Pelizzatti Perego family crafts alpine Nebbiolo — known locally as Chiavennasca — from terraced vineyards in Lombardia’s east-west alpine valley near the Swiss border. The house style emphasizes extended aging in large oak, and wines are only released when the estate deems them ready, resulting in current releases that are often a decade or more old. The wines are more elegant and perfumed than their Langhe counterparts, with a distinct mineral signature from the granite soils and high-altitude viticulture.
Appellations
- Valtellina — Lombardia; alpine valley; Nebbiolo as Chiavennasca
- Sassella — the estate’s primary sub-zone; source of the top Riservas
- Inferno — steep, sun-drenched slopes
- Grumello — east-facing; structured wines
Key Wines
- Sassella Riserva “Ultimi Raggi” — Vinous 94–95; the pinnacle cuvée; extended aging before release
- Inferno Riserva “Sesto Canto” — Vinous 95; from the Inferno sub-zone
- Grumello Riserva “Sant’Antonio” — Vinous 95; Grumello sub-zone
- Sassella Riserva “Rocce Rosse” — Vinous 93; another top Sassella bottling
- Sassella “Stella Retica” — the estate’s Sassella “normale”
- Il Pettirosso — entry-level Valtellina Superiore
Style Notes
Alpine Nebbiolo at its finest. Higher altitude and a longer growing season than the Langhe produce wines that are lighter in color and body but intensely perfumed — violets, mountain herbs, iron, dried flowers — with a crystalline mineral backbone from granitic soils. The extended large-oak aging (often 5+ years in botte) gives the wines an oxidative complexity at release that recalls mature Barolo, but with a transparency and ethereal quality all their own. These are wines built for decades of further cellaring; magnums of the 2009 vintage in the cellar suggest deliberate long-term aging.
My Cellar
~30 bottles (magnums included), vintages 2006–2017.
My Tastings
Sources
(cellar holdings; no article sources ingested yet)