Brunello di Montalcino 2021 by Fuligni tops Corriere wine guide

The Brunello di Montalcino 2021 from Eredi Fuligni is Italy's wine of the year in the 2027 edition of the Corriere della Sera guide "I migliori 100 Vini e Vignaioli d'Italia", which will be presented in Milan on 29 October and reach newsstands the following day.

The guide, now in its 13th edition, is edited by Luciano Ferraro, deputy editor of the Milan daily, with the wine selection signed by the American critic James Suckling. According to the preview reported by Vinetur and MontalcinoNews on 22 October, Suckling's team tasted around 7,000 Italian wines over the past year.

The ranking printed in the book is the one Suckling released in September as his Top 100 Wines of Italy 2026, where the Fuligni bottle already sat at number one. The stated reasons are quality, a reasonable price and real availability on the market. "It is clearly our number one wine," Suckling said, as quoted by MontalcinoNews.

The winning Brunello was chosen partly because a reader can still find it on a shelf.

Why the Brunello di Montalcino 2021 came first

Behind Fuligni come San Filippo's Brunello Le Lucere 2021, Roberto Voerzio's Barolo Brunate 2022 and, in fifth place, Tenuta San Guido's Sassicaia 2023. Twelve labels of Brunello di Montalcino 2021 make the top 100. Suckling calls 2021 one of the best Brunello harvests of the last two decades; Giacomo Bartolommei, president of the Consorzio del vino Brunello di Montalcino, used almost the same words in September.

Among the special prizes, Wine Manager goes to Giampiero Bertolini, chief executive of Biondi-Santi, and Winegrower of the Year to Chiara Lungarotti of Umbria. Montalcino keeps collecting recognition: Donatella Cinelli Colombini won DoctorWine's A Life for Wine award.

A family estate on the northeast slope

Giovanni Maria Fuligni settled in Montalcino in the early 1900s, and after his death in 1971 his daughter Maria Flora Fuligni took over, according to the winery. The property covers about 100 hectares on the northeast side of Montalcino, of which roughly 14 are vineyards, mostly Sangiovese, with the main plots at Cottimelli, between 380 and 450 metres above sea level.

The Brunello di Montalcino 2021 is pure Sangiovese and spends two and a half to three years in wood before release. Italian online retailers list it at roughly €75 to €100 a bottle, modest money next to the cult names of the denomination.

That is the logic of the list, and its limit. Masseto, Biondi-Santi, Monfortino and Bruno Giacosa are absent, Suckling notes, because the selection favours wines a reader can actually buy, and Ferraro concedes the guide does not necessarily include Italy's best producers. For Fuligni the next test is simpler: how many bottles of 2021 are still on the shelves after 30 October.