Do All Wine Bottles Have to Look the Same?


Wouldn’t it be nice to find a bottle that stood out from the rest.  Something you could take to a dinner party that could become a talking point before it is even opened. 

Well you can. And it should come as no surprise that it is an  Italian who has pushed the boundaries with an iconic combination of clever shapes and colour.

Cantine Ceci, a family owned winery from Emilia-Romagna, one of Italy’s most prolific wine regions, uses not one, but a series of clever and beautifully designed bottles to showcase its wine.  And once you’ve finished marveling at the bottles, and actually open one of these eye-catching bottles, you will experience wine of an exceedingly high quality and outstanding personality. A perfect match between bottle and wine.

At 240km wide, Emilia-Romagna spans almost the entire width of the northern Italian peninsula, sandwiched between Tuscany to the south, Lombardy and Veneto to the north and the Adriatic Sea to the east. Nine miles of Liguria is all that separates Emilia-Romagna from the Ligurian Sea, and is unique in that it is the only Italian region with both an east and a west coast. 

Cantine Ceci was officially established in 1938, but the family, and particularly Otello Ceci, have had reputation for producing wine from the grapes of hills of Parma, for many years before.  Otello owned a tavern in his local village in the foggy lower part of Parma. Apart from tasting his excellent culatelli and salami, the guests went “crazy” for the very dark lambrusco served in the bowls. Gradually, his reputation grew and his loyal customers pushed him to produce more wine. Year after year, that marvelous ritual of wine-pressing in October became his “job” and that of his children, so much so that almost 400 of the best wine-growers in the area competed in selling him their best harvest. Now 70 years on, this 3rd Generation Family winery (based in Torrile) is fast becoming one of the most respected in the region. Their vineyards are spread across the hills of Parma, where the steep and stony hills together with a soil that is mixed with rich sandy loam and limestone, creates wines with richness and power, combined with great aromatics and elegance.

 Therefore its no surprise that wines from Cantine Ceci are Grapes and Lager’s best sellers.

Our best selling red is the Cantine Ceci Arturo's Barbera-Bonarda 2010, which is from the Colli di Parma Rosso DOC and uses a combination of  exceedingly high quality Barbera and Bonarda grapes to produce a wine of outstanding personality. Everyone that drinks this red wine is completely taken by surprise. 

Our best selling sparkling wine is also from Cantine Ceci. Desdemona is a Brut sparkling wine whose elegant and delicate aromatic tastes characterise it without overwhelming it. Its name recalls the winemaker's passion for Verdi and his operas. Like the beautiful leather clad bottle, Desdemona is  a Italian beauty from Othello, a Shakespearean play and Verdi Opera. For the record, Desdemona enrages and disappoints her father, a Venetian senator, when she elopes with Othello, a man several years her senior

With Lambrusco making a big come back from the battering it received from those queasy memories from the 70's of a sweet, fizzy, purple plonk we drank as a teenager, its worth considering the wines leading today's Lambrusco revolution, including the Cantine Ceci masterpiece, Nerodi Lambrusco. These real Lambruscos are far more delicious, more complex and, importantly, much drier than the cheap, sweet pretenders of yesteryear. Cantine Ceci's Nerodi was the first Lambrusco in history to achieve the five clusters of the Italian Sommelier GuideThe Otello is an "extreme" Lambrusco, equipped with an important structure and a deep red purple color. It has been produced since 2003 by Cantine Ceci and has risen to become one of the most popular in Italy. 

A new edition to our Cantine Ceci collection is Decanta 68.2 Rosso IGT. This wine was requested by one of our customers and what an inspired recommendation it turned out to be. The most remarkable thing about this wine is the revolutionary bottle. The Italians are renowned for beautiful design and when this cleverly designed bottle is tilted (by 68.2 degrees), it becomes a decanter, which enables an excellent oxygenation of the wine. Made from a Cabernet Sauvignon blend, Decanta is an extraordinary modern red wine. Completely unwooded and bone dry, it is easy to drink and has a great fruity bouquet with a perfect balance between body and final mellowness.

Please view http://youtu.be/Pw3aeQVhzk4 for a review by Sommelier Pietro Brunelli, in which you can see this wine bottle in action. 

Grapes and Lager have two other wines from Cantine Ceci, being the Otello Dry No 2 and Tres Di Terre Verdiane Brut Extra NV , both also presented in beautifully exquisite bottles. 

Whilst Cantine Ceci is a very popular and well respected winery in Italy, it is relatively unknown in Australia. With its stunning bottles and high quality wine, we'd like to change that. Starting with You. 

Enjoy:))

 

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