Santi Dimitri. Three centuries of viticolture.

The Santi Dimitri farm was born in Galatina (Lecce) in 1690, where the Vallone family had moved from the Bari area to the early 1600s.

Galatina, in this ancient time, was a flourishing center in commerce and production. The Vallone family in 1600 it was already one of the most important bourgeois families for the history of this territory, differentiating its activity in different sectors for over seven centuries.

The Santi Dimitri winery, was founded in 1996 to give continuity to the long history of winemakers of Enzo Vallone’s family, entrepreneur and banker, a person of extreme foresight as he tells what he has created. Since 2014, the company has been run by his sons Carlo and Edoardo, continuing with the family business of which Angelo Vallone was the first three centuries before.

The name Santi Dimitri (San Demetrio) is the name of the 16th century’s Masseria which belongs to the Vallone family and where are present also part of its vineyards.

Carlo and Edoardo Vallone carry on the intuition of their father, combining the peasant know-how with the technological innovations to keep always in step.

The winery, contemporary guardian of ancient knowledge.

With a new concept an idea of modern wine vinification, the project of the Cantina Santi Dimitri was born, designed by the architect Luca Scacchetti with whom Enzo Vallone had established a profound and beautiful friendship (as Carlo Martin Vallone tells me).

The new building is located on a slight elevation called “serra salentina“, and you can not see if at the end there is a road that crosses the ancient olive grove between the remains of the old farm and the mill that are already part of a large project recovery.

Inaugurated in 2005, the new winery revisits the concept of the court building with a large outdoor courtyard. The facades are admired throughout their entire extension and thanks to the clean archetypal forms and the color of Lecce stone and Apricena stone capture the light and the attention of the visitor. Large openings on the front of the building look at the countryside, framing the grapes plant on one side, and the centuries-old olive oil trees around the farm and the old farmhouse.

A clean and linear structure that hides inside and preserves a small jewel: the barricaia with its exposed rock wall.

The Santi Dimitri Winery enjoys wide open spaces where you can admire the olive grove or the vineyards, immediately enjoying a space that seems far away and isolated from the rest of the world while being just outside the city of Galatina.

In these spaces, is a good idea to stopping and consume the local gastronomic products accompanied by the excellent wines of the company, is an almost obligatory moment and one would never want to leave.

The cultivation areas

The Santi Dimitri winery owns several land that produces its wines. The same are located in different positions on the terriotory, affected by a different air, sunshine and soil quality. The vineyards are located in the countryside between Galatina and Cutrofiano and also include olive groves, arable land and a wood of ancient holm oaks.

Galatina is located almost equidistant from the Ionian and Adriatic Seas. Therefore, the vineyards of the Santi Dimitri receive the breeze of both seas
The vines grown on such land are Primitivo, Negroamaro, Aleatico, Fiano, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Merlot, Pinot Blanc.

Production

Precious products such as Sharav, a wine with a ruby red color, with purple reflections, the son of a skilful and rare fusion between the two typical  grapes of Salento, Primitivo and Negroamaro. End to the nose, incredibly balanced and harmonious, perfect synthesis of the color and perfumes of Primitivo and the rigor and elegance of Negroamaro.

And then a wine that is the result of an intelligent intuition or a wine produced from a cloned grape of Fiano di Avellino that is not a direct son of the Salento terroir, but that in the most sandy areas around Galatina and Cutrofiano can give strong emotions. This vintage 2016 white wine present a richly scented, and it is sapid, acid, balanced and with good structure.

Finally, particular attention is given to the production of the king of Salento Rosato da Negroamaro, a wine symbol of the millenary viticulture of Salento that remaining true to itself in the color and sobriety of the perfumes in the mouth gives an incredible plot played on a marked acidity, a good structure and an incredibly long persistence on the palate.

A welcome from another time

Carlo’s stories and hospitality make you feel immediately at home, as a family, as if we were back to visit a long-standing friend. A friend who enchants with family stories but, above all, with those of his wines. Carlo describes them with care and in his words show the love for this company and the passion for his work.

The name of the company “Dimitri” is all a program and could not be otherwise. In fact, “Demetrios” that derives from “Demeter” or “Demetra” is the name of the ancient Greek goddess of the Earth or “Mother Earth” therefore associated with the fields and agriculture. In a territory as fertile as that owned by the Vallone family, with a centuries-old olive grove and its magnificent expanses of vines, the name could not be more appropriate.

Visit Santi Dimitri winery

The Santi Dimitri winery can be visited through our winetour “The Elegance of Negroamaro” or booking a tour of the Galatina + Santi Dimitri Winery (on request).

The “L’Eleganza del Negroamaro” tour includes a visit to 3 cellars with tasting of 10 labels, a visit to the vineyard, a light lunch. You can book clicking Here.