Why it matters
The producer
Farina arrived at the fourth generation and made a choice that most family wineries in Valpolicella do not: they called a university. Claudio and Elena Farina, cousins who took over from the previous generation in the early 2000s, inherited a working winery founded in the early 19th century and decided to modernize it through measurement rather than through aesthetics. The winery sits in Pedemonte, inside the Valpolicella Classica zone, which is the historical heartland of Amarone production in the Veneto. That geography matters because Classica-zone fruit carries a particular weight and aromatic density, and Farina's Amarone della Valpolicella DOCG Classico is built to show that character at international scale: 70% of production leaves Italy.
The operation manages 80 hectares in total, 10 owned and 70 held through long-term grower partnerships. In 2018 the family formalized those partnerships under a project called Transparency, vision 2018, which mapped and published each contributor's vineyard and production details for the range, not only the estate parcels.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
Valpolicella Classica is the western sub-zone of the broader Valpolicella DOC, a cluster of valleys running north from Verona toward the foothills of the Lessini mountains. Pedemonte sits at the southern edge of that classic zone, close enough to Lake Garda that the lake's thermal mass moderates summer heat and prevents the sharp temperature swings that would strip acidity from the grapes. From the north, cold air drains down from Monte Baldo and the Lessini range, slowing ripening through the season and holding the acid levels that keep Amarone, despite its 15% alcohol, from feeling flat.
The combination shows directly in the wines. Corvina, the dominant grape in Valpolicella blends, is sensitive to warmth: too much and it loses the cherry lift that defines the style. The lake and mountain interplay in Pedemonte keeps that lift in place even as the appassimento drying process concentrates the fruit toward richness.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
Farina owns 10 hectares and draws on 70 additional hectares from contracted growers, all within the Valpolicella Classica zone. The 2018 Transparency project made each grower parcel traceable, so the provenance of every grape in every wine can be documented. That matters in a region where most volume comes from contracted fruit: Farina's answer to the sourcing question is accountability rather than pretending the estate is self-sufficient.
Wines to know
The range in view
Farina's range moves in four clear steps through the Valpolicella hierarchy.
At the base, the Valpolicella Classico is a fresh, lighter-bodied red built primarily from Corvina and Rondinella, with the cherry fruit and moderate body typical of the appellation at village level. It is the everyday wine of the range.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
Start with the Amarone della Valpolicella DOCG Classico. It is fifty percent Corvina from the Classica zone, dried for months before pressing, fermented to 15% alcohol, and aged eighteen months across Slavonian casks and barriques. The nose opens on cherry and black cherry with cocoa and a balsamic thread, the palate is full and warm with firm tannins from the limestone and clay soils beneath Pedemonte. This is modern Amarone: fruit forward, structured, and built to carry the weight of the wine's alcohol without sacrificing the Corvina lift.