Agricola Punica

When you’ve been the principal technical and creative architect of one of Italy’s most esteemed and transformative wine categories, you’re really not going to have much time for outside interests. One would imagine that Giacomo Tachis—one of the pivotal minds behind the legends of the Super-Tuscan movement (Sassicaia, Tignanello, Solaia, and Solengo, just to name a few)—wouldn’t be looking beyond his numerous Tuscan involvements, especially to...

What exactly did he see in Sardegna? Paradoxically, it looked a lot like Toscana pre-Sassicaia—a place that didn’t have much credibility on the national wine scene, let alone the international front. In fact, Tachis believed that Sardegna was undermining itself, relying on practices that did not complement Sardegna’s climatic constitution. Such negligence certainly did not befit the former oenological glory of Southern Italy, which had flouris...

It was during one of his first visits to the Sulcis area, Southwest Sardinia, that Tachis realized the great potential of this land for producing red wines. While a new chapter in the Sardinian winemaking was being written by Tachis, Cantina Santadi launched its first high quality bottled red wine, the Terre Brune, which traced the path for many other successful wines that came along, signed by the genius of Tachis; Barrua is one of this.

I...