This month the Italian fashion designer Brunello Cucinelli launched his first wine – vintage 2018 – in Milan. Cucinelli, famous for his soft and relaxed luxury clothing, hosted a dinner in the city’s Istituto dei Ciechi to introduce a gathering of friends and journalists to his Italian Bordeaux blend.

The designer planted his vineyard on his estate surrounding the medieval hilltop town of Solomeo, also the home of the brand’s HQ in Umbria. During his restoration of Solomeo, the five hectares given over to his 20,000 vines were planted in 2011 in a wave formation. Here, there are three soil types, each paired with a different grape variety: alluvial clay-sandy, alluvial clay-silt and marly arenaceous. The grapes used for the Castello di Solomeo red are cabernet franc, cabernet sauvignon and merlot, from which the prestigious Bordeaux blend is made. Sangiovese grapes are added as a tribute to the culture and tradition of winemaking in Central Italy.

‘In our Solomeo, we have allotted five hectares to vines that are cultivated according to the classic principles of viticulture, which I consider a true art,’ says Cucinelli. ‘I like to think that our grapes can finally tell their own story of beauty.’

Although the vintage is a first for Cucinelli, the result is highly sophisticated, a wine that is structured and soft simultaneously. The designer revealed that he has had internationally renowned oenologist Riccardo Cotarella as ‘a friendly advisor’.

‘It was really exciting to savour the first sip of this wine that – at least for me – is very, very special, born from our land and from a work of great care and passion,’ adds Cucinelli.

The designer sees winemaking as part of a long and noble tradition. ‘I believe there is nothing more beautiful than sharing this precious fruit, born out of a long process of care and custody, with lifelong friends and loved ones.’

And as a man given to expounding the virtues of humanist philosophy, it comes as no surprise that Cucinelli sees himself as perpetuating a practice that brings pleasure and social conviviality. As he says, ‘Just as it was in ancient Greece, I like to imagine that this wine of ours can gladden the most pleasant symposia of people renewing this most human of rituals. With the work Deipnosophistae, [Dinner-table Philosophers] by Athenaeus, after all, it is fine to recall that it was precisely ‘on the sea the colour of wine that Dionysus brought all that is good for men”.’

brunellocucinelli.com; shop.brunellocucinelli.com/en-gb/