Why it matters
The producer
Giampaolo Motta was 31 when he bought a neglected estate in the Conca d'Oro and started over. He had studied chemical engineering in France, spent his weekends in Bordeaux, and arrived at a Sangiovese property in Panzano in Chianti with a family-guaranteed bank loan and a clear idea of what he wanted the wine to be. The problem was that Chianti Classico had rules about what that wine could contain.
By 1996 Motta was grafting Sangiovese vines to Merlot. Cabernet Sauvignon followed in 1998. Petit Verdot was in the ground by 2003. The blends he was building in his gravity-fed cellar in Panzano's Conca d'Oro no longer conformed to the Chianti Classico consortium's variety requirements. In 2002 he left the consortium rather than adjust the wine. Every bottle La Massa has released since carries IGT Toscana on the label.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
The Conca d'Oro is the name Panzano's growers give to the amphitheatre of hills that surrounds the village, an inward-facing bowl of south- and southwest-facing slopes that concentrates warmth and light in a way the broader Chianti Classico ridge does not. La Massa sits within this bowl at around 360 metres, high enough for cooler nights that slow ripening through the growing season and hold acidity in the grapes at harvest.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
The 25 hectares sit on south- and southwest-facing slopes in the Conca d'Oro, with the main grape varieties divided across parcels mapped during the 1990s zonation study. Sangiovese remains on the estate, concentrated in the plots best suited to the variety, including plot six, the source for Carla 6. Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Petit Verdot cover the parcels selected during the grafting and replanting programs.
The cellar is gravity-fed. Fruit moves from the sorting area downward through the winery by gravity, removing the need for pumping between stages and reducing mechanical stress on the grapes. Fermentation and maceration run for 20 to 28 days in tank across the range. The extended maceration window extracts colour, tannin, and depth from the skins without requiring intervention to compensate for short contact time. Derenoncourt and Lavenu consult on winemaking decisions; Mazzi executes them on the ground.
Wines to know
The range in view
La Massa makes two wines, both labelled IGT Toscana.
Giorgio Primo is the estate's Grand Vin. The blend draws on Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Cabernet Franc alongside Sangiovese, with the Bordeaux varieties at the centre of the wine's character. The 2018 vintage is a dark, concentrated red with cassis and cedar from the Cabernet Sauvignon, plum and roundness from the Merlot, and the structural backbone of a wine designed for ageing. Tannins are present and firm in youth, the oak integration measured, and the finish long. It enters international markets through the Place de Bordeaux, the négociant distribution network associated with classified Bordeaux châteaux.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
Start with Carla 6. It is 100% Sangiovese from plot six in the Conca d'Oro, named for Motta's daughter and the specific parcel the wine comes from. In the glass it is firm and direct: dark cherry, graphite, brisk acidity, and dry tannins from the Galestro and scaly clay underfoot. There is no Bordeaux-variety softness here, no international rounding. What you get is Sangiovese on a specific slope in Panzano, vinified cleanly and aged to show the parcel's mineral edge and the grape's natural grip.