This Sparkling Wine Is Having a Surprising Comeback—so I Went to Italy to See How It's Made

Travel + Leisure

10-05-2025

In the hilltop village of Castelvetro di Modena, they were dancing in the streets. It was mid-September, and the revelers were there for the town's annual Sagra dell'Uva, or Grape Festival. All over the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna, winemakers were picking, pressing, and fermenting the latest vintage of Lambrusco, a predominantly red sparkling wine that has been produced there for centuries.
In Castelvetro that night, the lines for the bars snaked through the throng of dancers in the main square. A DJ blasted tunes from the steps of the village hall as the light from a giant disco ball strafed the crowd.
I had come to Italy to meet a group of winemakers who are changing Lambrusco's international reputation. Outside of Italy, the idea that this wine deserves celebration may come as a surprise. In the late 1960s, Riunite, a wine cooperative, began exporting a dark-red, powerfully sweet version of the drink. Lambrusco became synonymous with that sickly tipple—which bore no resemblance to the refreshingly dry and crisp Lambrusco guzzled by Italians. From Left: The lobby at Relais Roncolo 1888; a glass of Lambrusco at Opera02.
Relais Roncolo 1888; Amanda VillaRosa
But the world is waking up to the real thing. Lambrusco now appears on restaurant and wine-bar menus from London to Los Angeles, and it has some big-name evangelists. Cameron Diaz's wine brand, Avaline, includes a Lambrusco produced in Emilia-Romagna.
My self-driving trip around the region was organized by Travel + Leisure A-List member Matteo Della Grazia of Fuoritinerario–Discover Your Italy. It began at Opera02, a wine and vinegar producer a couple of miles from Castelvetro. Spread across 42 acres of rolling hills dotted with farmhouses, the estate has an eight-room B&B at its center, housed in a converted barn. The minute I entered I was hit by the powerful aroma of fermenting grapes—not from wine, but from hundreds of barrels of DOP-certified balsamic vinegar, which were maturing in a glass-walled loft next to the lobby.
I met the owner, Mattia Montanari, on the terrace overlooking his fields. He specializes in a grape called Grasparossa, one of 13 cultivated Lambrusco varieties. Its name means 'red stalk,' and below us waves of crimson were washing through the vines as they darkened into their fall colors. From Left: Lambrusco grapes at Cantina Paltrinieri; Roncolo 1888's cypress-lined driveway.
Cantina Paltrinieri; Relais Roncolo 1888
Montanari, who grew up in Castelvetro, does not come from a family of winemakers (his parents were in real estate). He was driven into the business by his love of Lambrusco and his frustration at the scorn it received abroad. 'I felt bad,' he said. 'I knew the real Lambrusco, and I wanted to show it off.'
He started his vineyard in 2002 with 10 acres, all organically cultivated, and over the years added to it bit by bit. He opened the hotel about a decade ago to draw more tourists and showcase his wines. He now produces 70,000 bottles a year—about 75 percent of which are sold to the U.S.
Part of Lambrusco's appeal, he said, is its versatility. Most often used for sparkling dark reds, it also comes in white and rosé, and can be bone-dry or fruit-forward and aromatic. 'You can have a whole meal with just Lambrusco,' he said. As we chatted he opened a bottle and poured us a couple of glasses. The color was deep and dark—the kind of shade I associate with heavy reds. But this was fresh and effervescent, with soft bubbles, silky tannins, and subtle notes of cherry and blueberry. It was light enough to work as an aperitif, but its cleansing acidity would work equally well with meat. In other words, it was frighteningly easy to drink.
Next, I drove 40 minutes north, into the flatlands of the Po Valley, where I met Cecilia Paltrinieri, a fourth-generation winemaker in her mid 20s. Her family's vineyard, Cantina Paltrinieri, was started by her great-grandfather, who made wine for fun. He also built the elegant red-brick buildings clustered around the warehouse where the wine is made today. After a tour of the vineyard—including the towering steel vats where the recent harvest was beginning to ferment—we sat down in the tasting room.
The bar at Relais Roncolo 1888's Limonaia restaurant.
I asked Paltrinieri to explain Lambrusco's growing popularity. 'We are seeing a big trend for easy wines, and a turn away from rich, complex wines,' she said. 'That's why so many people have been drinking pale rosé.' She brought out a bottle of Radice, one of her rosé Lambruscos. Made from a grape called Lambrusco di Sorbara, which grows in the plains between the Secchia and Panaro rivers, it is tartly acidic and carries hints of orange and rhubarb. Because it is bottle-fermented with natural yeast, it also has that earthy funk beloved by fans of natural wine. With its steel cap and slightly cloudy complexion, it would fit right in at any wine bar in Brooklyn.
As the global appeal of Lambrusco has grown, more of Emilia-Romagna's winemakers have turned their vineyards into fashionable destinations. One afternoon I stopped at Cantina Ventiventi, opened in 2018 by Vittorio Razzaboni and his three sons, Riccardo, Andrea, and Tommaso. The Razzabonis are luring visitors with cool, contemporary architecture: the vineyard's main building is a Modernist glass box surrounded by geometric, Japanese-inspired pools and a waterfall, where you can enjoy a crisp glass of Lambrusco in one of the bubble chairs that dot the patio. Inside, the event space (and occasional restaurant) is overlooked by a giant red teddy bear.
I was on my way to Relais Roncolo 1888 , a vineyard hotel at the opposite end of the design spectrum. It's part of the 320-acre Tenuta di Roncolo estate, in the foothills of the Apennine Mountains, which dates back to the 15th century. In 2015 it was bought by Julia Prestia, a Viennese ex-financier, and her Sicilian husband, Giuseppe. The couple set about renovating the estate's 19th-century villa and outbuildings, turning them into a sumptuous hotel that mixes original touches like frescoed ceilings with mid-century Italian furniture. My room, tricked out in shades of mushroom, opened onto a hallway covered in its original wallpaper, depicting a sea battle complete with roiling water, boats full of pugnacious sailors, and, in the background, a dusky landscape of ancient ruins.
The afternoon I arrived, I walked down the long, cypress-lined driveway to the winery to meet Prestia and the vineyard's experience manager, Vittorio Baghi. As we headed inside, we passed a covered courtyard where several members of Prestia's team were feeding freshly picked grapes into a juicing machine. The estate's previous owners began to make wine there back in the 1970s, and by the 80s the flagship bottle was a rich red Lambrusco called Rubino del Cerro. It is still made today, along with a dizzying assortment of other varieties, including elegant whites with the biscuity fizz of champagne.
Prestia has taken an entrepreneurial approach to finding a new audience for her wines. At one point she opened a bottle of the sparkling Lambrusco that she says is her way of 'piggybacking on the rosé trend.' She hopes that it can be a gateway into the world of Lambrusco for those who've never tried it before. 'That's what is so fun about it,' she said. 'It's not one thing. It's such a wide spectrum.'
For the next hour, Baghi brought out bottle after bottle until there were about a dozen arrayed on the table, each a subtly different expression. When we finished our tasting, Prestia offered to give me a lift back up the hill to the hotel. But my head was as cloudy as the bottle-fermented Lambrusco I'd just drunk. I needed the walk.
A version of this story first appeared in the June 2025 issue of Travel + Leisure under the headline 'Italian Revival .'