Banfi was founded in Tuscany in the late 1970s. The name of the company has distant origins and is a tribute to Teodolinda Banfi, great-granddaughter of the two Mariani brothers, founders of one of the best known and most popular wine labels in the world. Teodolinda was an expert wine connoisseur and passed on this passion to her nephew Giovanni, who in 1919 founded Banfi Vintners, a well-known wine import company in the United States.
Later John and Harry Mariani, Giovanni's sons, decided to combine distribution with their own production and founded a winery in 1978 in Tuscany on the rolling hills of Montalcino. Thus Banfi was born.
Banfi's vital heart beats in the 2830 hectares of the Castello Banfi estate, one third of which is planted with vines and the remainder with olive groves, orchards and woodland. The main grape variety is Sangiovese, but there is also room for the international Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc.
Each cultivated according to a careful study of the territory and microclimatic conditions not only of Montalcino, but also of the Bolgheri and Chianti areas where Banfi has over time extended its vineyards.
Banfi's production has always been based on the search for product quality and excellence both in the vineyard and in the cellar. From the outset, numerous studies were conducted on Sangiovese clones to find the best clonal variants, capable of expressing all the complexity of this extraordinary grape variety. Of the 650 clones originally identified, fifteen were selected, and since 1992, each new planting has included 3 or 4 different clones that complement each other.
Research was also conducted on the wood of the more than 7000 barriques in which the company's great red wines rest. The French oak, chosen for ageing, is seasoned and toasted directly on the estate. There was also no lack of innovation in the wine cellar, where the grapes, rigorously selected by hand, ferment in composite vats that maximise the qualities of wood and steel together.