What She Waited Thirty Years For
Elena Penna and Luca Currado drove past the cascina for thirty years.
Every time, one of them said something. The farmhouse built in 1554. One of the oldest in the Barolo region, sitting just above the Lazzarito MGA on the edge of Serralunga. It had been a hospital once. A church property. Then empty, for years, its stone walls going the way of stone walls that nobody is tending.
In January 2023, they left Vietti — the estate Luca's family had built into one of Barolo's most celebrated names — and announced Cascina Penna-Currado. Thirty-five harvests at Vietti. Then this.
The first wines were not Barolo. Dolcetto, Barbera, Langhe Nebbiolo from San Sebastiano — a corner of Monforte that was inside the Barolo zone and quietly removed in the 1970s when the farmers there found Nebbiolo difficult to ripen. With global warming, that area now receives cool Alpine wind and is having its best performance. Fifty years later, the land they gave up is producing some of the most interesting Nebbiolo in the region. The exit turned out to be premature.
The first Barolo from Cascina Penna-Currado will be released in 2027.
The farmhouse waited thirty years for the right people. The San Sebastiano vineyards waited fifty years for the right climate. The Barolo is waiting four more years in the cellar.
Patience at every stage, in every direction.
They drove past for thirty years. Now they are here.
Cascina Penna-Currado, Serralunga d'Alba. Founded 2023 by Elena Penna and Luca Currado Vietti after 35 harvests at Vietti. The cascina dates to 1554. First Barolo release 2027.
