Skerk Malvazija 2010

Duino Aurisina, Friuli

Skerk is the brainchild of Sandi Skerk, born in 1987 in Duino Aurisina, 3 km from the Gulf of Trieste, and is now famous among natural wine enthusiasts all over the world.

The estate has around 8 hectares of vineyards on the Karst Plateau, from which wines of character and elegance are born, the highest expression of the purity of the terroir from which they come.

The vineyards are located at an altitude of about 300 metres and represent the indigenous vines of the area, Vitovska, Malvasia and Teran; they are joined by Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Grigio, which are practically adopted children of the area.

The rugged Karst hills boast soils rich in iron and limestone and a relatively mild, breezy climate, and the approach to viticulture is completely natural and aimed at protecting the rich local biodiversity. Vineyard care is thorough and there is no trace of systemic chemistry.

In the cellar, practices are equally minimalist, with spontaneous fermentations from indigenous yeasts in wooden vats and long macerations on the skins, especially for the white berries from which the house specialities, i orange wines.

Ageing always takes place in wood tending to exhaustion and the wines are bottled without filtration or clarification, and with a homeopathic addition of sulphur dioxide only when necessary.

Superb, and worth mentioning, is the winery's cellar dug into the rock, within which the ideal habitat for storing and ageing wine is created.