Last Updated on October 2, 2026
Before the winery, before the labels, and even before the wines, there was a question: how does Pinot Noir truly express itself across the different hills of the Oltrepò Pavese?
The answer emerged through a long research journey. It was from a vineyard zoning project developed together with the University of Milan that La Genisia took shape, a company established in 2020 as a project of the Torrevilla Group, with the aim of enhancing the most suitable areas of the western Oltrepò Pavese and telling the story of the territory through one of its most representative grape varieties.
The project examined 110 vineyard parcels, analyzing factors such as soil composition and origin, exposure, slope, altitude, temperature, rainfall, and humidity. This work made it possible to identify the most promising vineyards and select the 70 hectares and 20 growers that today make up La Genisia, spread across Codevilla, Torrazza Coste, Mornico Losana, the Coppa Valley, and the Schizzola Valley.
Vineyard zoning is much more than a simple mapping exercise. It is a tool capable of interpreting the landscape in all its complexity, helping to understand how each hillside influences vine behavior and, consequently, the identity of the wine. For La Genisia, every vineyard has its own “identity card,” built through soil analyses, agronomic trials, and continuous monitoring of climatic data.
To support this work, six weather stations have been installed, one for each identified macro-climatic area. The information collected, integrated with the soil’s physical and chemical analyses, is compiled into an operational manual shared with the growers and constantly updated. This allows every agronomic decision to be tailored to the characteristics of each individual parcel, avoiding uniform approaches and guiding every vineyard toward its own balance.
“The most beautiful sensation a wine can convey is the ability to tell the story of the territory it comes from,” says Simone Fiori, winemaker at La Genisia. “Pinot Noir is our stylistic compass: it is a grape variety that interprets terroir with remarkable precision and allows us to build a recognizable and highly contemporary winemaking language.”
Highly sensitive to variations in soil, exposure, altitude, and microclimate, Pinot Noir is able to reflect in the glass the differences between one hillside and another. For this reason, it represents the heart of the La Genisia project and the foundation of its agronomic and winemaking choices: not a grape variety to be reduced to a single expression, but an interpreter through which to understand the many identities of the Oltrepò Pavese.
The results of the zoning project are reflected in the wines themselves. The La Genisia Pinot Nero Extra Brut Oltrepò Pavese Metodo Classico DOCG comes from vineyards located primarily in the Coppa Valley, the Schizzola Valley, and the municipalities of Codevilla and Torrazza Coste, in a mosaic of different altitudes, exposures, and soils. Careful grape selection and a minimum of 24 months on the lees translate the area’s sparkling wine vocation into a Metodo Classico defined by freshness, precision, and finesse.
Still wine vinification finds its most selective expression in the Centodieci Pinot Nero dell’Oltrepò Pavese DOC, produced from a 0.8-hectare parcel located in Mornico Losana, in the locality of Cascina Coraggioso. Identified through the zoning project, the vineyard sits at approximately 250 meters above sea level on the calcareous marl soils of the mid-Apennine hills. It is a tangible example of how parcel-by-parcel analysis can identify a specific vocation and translate it into a wine with a precise territorial identity.
This knowledge also represents a strategic tool for addressing the challenges of contemporary viticulture. Understanding the behavior of each vineyard parcel makes it possible to adopt increasingly targeted practices, preserve vineyard balance, and more accurately determine the best use of the grapes. With La Genisia, vineyard zoning becomes both a working method and a production philosophy: not to standardize, but to enhance differences. Because not all hills are the same, and it is precisely in their diversity that the most authentic identity of Pinot Noir from the Oltrepò Pavese can be found.
