MANFREDO

Manfredo is the Merlot of the Monastero di Aquileia estate — the wine that carries one of the most beloved international red varieties into the specific mineral conditions of the Friuli Aquileia DOC, where the clay soils rich in mineral salts, the bora winds off the Trieste Karst, and the salt-laden Grado lagoon breezes create a growing environment of considerable and unusual specificity. Named for Manfredo — a name of Germanic origin meaning peace and power — the wine carries both the gentleness and the substance that good Merlot consistently delivers.

Merlot has been present in Friuli since the nineteenth century, when it was introduced along with other Bordeaux varieties as part of the broader movement to modernise Italian viticulture with internationally proven varieties. In Friuli it has found one of its most consistent and most characterful Italian expressions — a Merlot of fresh acidity, aromatic clarity, and textural softness that the cool, mineral, oceanic-influenced conditions of this corner of north-east Italy reliably produce.

The wine presents as garnet red — a deeper, more developed colour than the vivid ruby of younger reds, signalling a wine that has begun the chromatic development that ageing brings. On the nose, aromatic notes of sour cherry and wild berries dominate, with red fruit, currant, and elegant silky tannins completing the picture of a wine of genuine refinement.

The elegant silky tannins that the estate identifies as one of Manfredo's most distinctive qualities are the hallmark of Merlot produced in conditions of optimal ripeness — a textural quality that makes the wine immediately accessible and genuinely pleasurable from the moment of release while suggesting the capacity for further development in bottle.

Available through UniqueWines.