Winemaker Notes
Ruby red verging on garnet. The bouquet is intense, complex, fruit-forward and spicy with hints or ripe red berry fruits enriched by various spicy notes. Warm, soft and harmonic on the palate. Great balance among pronounced tannins, acidity and savoriness. This elegant wine has great potential for further cellar aging.
Great companion of stewed and roasted meat and game (such as hare, pheasant and wild boar). Excellent with mature cheeses.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
From a warm, Mediterranean-leaning vintage, the 2017 Brunello Di Montalcino Pianrosso pours a slightly more saturated red hue and keeps impressive purity. The nose opens with graphite, black cherries, toasted spice, and dried Mediterranean herbs. Full-bodied, it has broader tannins and more grip than the 2018, yet it stays balanced with enough acidity to keep the finish fresh and persistent.
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Wine Enthusiast
This full-bodied red starts off with aromas of leather, forest floor and camphor. Enveloping and structured, the palate shows a weightless concentration, featuring dried cherry, licorice, tobacco and a hint of orange zest framed in velvety tannins. Best After 2024
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James Suckling
This is a beautifully crafted and polished Brunello for this vintage, with full body and creamy, lightly chewy tannins. Dark berries, walnuts and cedar with dried-flower undertones. Needs time to soften, but very pretty. Drink after 2024.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The Ciacci Piccolomini d'Aragona 2017 Brunello di Montalcino Pianrosso shows nice balance and elegance, and it definitely shows the deft hand of the winemaking team in what was not an easy vintage by any stretch. This pretty wine delivers lots of fresh cherry and wild rose, with ferrous earthy, licorice and grilled herb; I also get bay leaf and rosemary sprig. Like the annata 2017 Brunello produced by this estate, the single-vineyard Brunello Pianrosso is distinguished by a sweet cherry note (plus a hefty 15% alcohol) that accompanies the wine from start to finish
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Wine Spectator
This red exhibits sappy, concentrated flavors of cherry, currant, plum, tobacco and soy. Shows intensity mid palate, persisting on the firm, chalky finish. Best from 2025.
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Decanter
Shows a ripe cherry flavor melted with hints of blood orange, supported by firm sticky tannins and crisp acidity.
Among Italy's elite red grape varieties, Sangiovese has the perfect intersection of bright red fruit and savory earthiness and is responsible for the best red wines of Tuscany. While it is best known as the chief component of Chianti, it is also the main grape in Vino Nobile di Montepulciano and reaches the height of its power and intensity in the complex, long-lived Brunello di Montalcino. Somm Secret—Sangiovese doubles under the alias, Nielluccio, on the French island of Corsica where it produces distinctly floral and refreshing reds and rosés.
Famous for its bold, layered and long-lived red, Brunello di Montalcino, the town of Montalcino is about 70 miles south of Florence, and has a warmer and drier climate than that of its neighbor, Chianti. The Sangiovese grape is king here, as it is in Chianti, but Montalcino has its own clone called Brunello.
The Brunello vineyards of Montalcino blanket the rolling hills surrounding the village and fan out at various elevations, creating the potential for Brunello wines expressing different styles. From the valleys, where deeper deposits of clay are found, come wines typically bolder, more concentrated and rich in opulent black fruit. The hillside vineyards produce wines more concentrated in red fruits and floral aromas; these sites reach up to over 1,600 feet and have shallow soils of rocks and shale.
Brunello di Montalcino by law must be aged a minimum of four years, including two years in barrel before realease and once released, typically needs more time in bottle for its drinking potential to be fully reached. The good news is that Montalcino makes a “baby brother” version. The wines called Rosso di Montalcino are often made from younger vines, aged for about a year before release, offer extraordinary values and are ready to drink young.