The owner of Contrada Palui is Hannes (Hans Karl) Pichler. As a little boy he could not get enough of the grapes in his grandfather's wine estate in St. Justina above Bolzano and regularly returned home with a stomach ache.

 

The farm was lost when he was a teenager, but the grapes and wine never left him.

After studying in London (LSE) and Oxford and working in London and Milan, he returned to South Tyrol and devoted himself to  renewable energies. At the same time he attended cellar management and sommelier courses and began to make wine.

 

When the opportunity arose to plant vineyards in the Valpolicella and Amarone area near Verona, he took the chance.

 

Contrada Palui literally is a greenfield operation. Where vineyards are today there used to be green meadows that had never seen pesticides. To stay true to this tradition, rigorous biological farming is practiced. An old hay barn was converted into a small cellar that now houses the barrels and amphorae.