94 pts The Wine Advocate
Drink Date: 2025 - 2032
This is always one of my favorite wines from Pieropan. Fruit comes from an 8.5-hectare cru planted in 1971 on volcanic soils, and the wine is aged in cement vats for a prolonged 15 months. The organic 2023 Soave Classico Calvarino (made with 70% Garganega and 30% Trebbiano di Soave) is a real beauty, with textural heft and an especially silky approach that wraps smoothly over the palate. The bouquet is beautifully complex with hints of honey, apricot and poached apple. I love the intensity and the seamless quality of this mid-weight white. Salty mineral nuances fuel an elegant mouthfeel. Production is 60,000 bottles. The Pieropan family recently completed a new Soave winery dedicated to patriarch Leonildo Pieropan and opened a wine Relais for guests. They have also started to experiment with mildew-resistant PIWI grapes now planted in a site above the winery. Published: Aug 14, 2025

96 pts Kerin O`Keefe
The Pieropan Soave Classico Calvarino is always one of the best whites not just in the denomination but in all of Italy, and the 2023 is no exception. Made with organically farmed grapes – 70% Garganega and 30% Trebbiano cultivated in volcanic soils - and fermented and aged in tulip-shaped concrete tanks, it opens with aromas of white spring wildflower, citrus, wet flint, Alpine herb and stone fruit. It’s dry and delicious, delivering pear, Myer lemon, dried herb and smoky mineral notes before closing on a saline tang. The advanced age of the vines, 30-60 years old, lends great depth while fresh acidity keeps it balanced and lends serious aging potential.

The Calvarino vineyard is located in the heart of the Soave Classico area and represents the old family estate, purchased in 1901. The name Calvarino comes from ‘little calvary’, because of the difficulty of working the basalt soil and because of the tortuous path to reach the bottom. Calvarino, an iconic wine since 1971, the first single vineyard from white grapes in Italy, represents the most long-lived and authentic expression of Soave wine.

Soil: Volcanic, rich in tuff stone and basalt rocks
Grape varieties: Garganega 70%, Trebbiano di Soave 30%.
Average age of the vines: 30-60 years, depending on the vineyard
Exposure: west
Training system: Pergola Veronese (4000 vines per hectare) and Guyot
Agriculture methods: organic certified
ABV%: Vol. 12.5%

HARVEST Hand-picked, usually in two times to select the ripest grapes. The picking begins in mid-September for Trebbiano di Soave and in October for the Garganega grapes
VINIFICATION The grapes are destemmed and gently crushed with a pneumatic press, in nitrogen saturation. The free run juice is fermented separately at low temperature (between 14-18°C) in glass-lined concrete ‘tulipe’ tanks.
MATURATION The wine ages in glass-lined concrete ‘tulipe’ tanks for 12-15 months. During this period, it remains on its fine lees to increase richness and complexity. The noble lees are moved periodically through manual battonage. After bottling, it ages slowly in the bottle for a few months before release.