2017: an excellent wine-year with good results

A year full of challenges, featuring on one hand a very hot spring, surprising as well as dramatic night frosts and on the other one a long, hot summer, which ended all of a sudden. A big challenge for many producers. Stephan Filippi, cellar master at Cantina Bolzano has summarized this wine-year for us, also suggesting an overview.

South Tyrol looks back to a very challenging year. How was 2017 for St. Magdalener?

Filippi: 2017 was indeed a year marked by extremes. It began with a very dry spring, followed by a hot dry summer with violent thunderstorms. Luckily, the St. Magdalener area was spared by the damages caused by bad weather that has been creating a lot of problems in other areas.

Besides quantity, has quality also suffered?

Filippi: the dry spring and the hot summer with its low level of rains gave us smaller but actually juicier grapes. Autumn has begun slowly and at the very beginning did not seem very promising, but the grape quality got better and better from one week to another. We are pretty satisfied by the quality of the grapes.

What about the harvest?

Filippi: It was calm and pleasant. The fermentation has been constant and continuous, and it still is. In some cases, the biological degradation of acids has already begun.

When will be the St. Magdalener wines 2017 available?

Filippi: The St. Magdalener wines 2017 will be available and ready to be tasted next spring, probably in early March. As always, you can taste the previews at the most important European wine fairs, including Vinitaly and ProWein.

What about the selling expectations 2017?

Filippi: We are very optimistic and we are convinced that the quality will be excellent also this year.