Rufina

The museum is in Rufina: when the name of the place is mixed up with the name of the wine.
We know, in fact, about the existence of vines and cellars in the Sieve Valley since the Middle Ages. But as elsewhere we must wait at least the 18th century to find precise verifications of quality. And at the second half of the next century, the full confirmation of the identity and quality of the wine of the valley comes out: thanks to the collective participation, of strong-willed individuals who work in research and experimentation as well as in the production on a large scale and the consequent far reaching commercialisation. From Vittorio Albizi to the Ruffino cousins: between passion and business, the same that was happening in Chianti with Bettino Ricasoli and in Montalcino with Clemente Biondi Santi.
Consequently the need of a museum to explain the past, above all with the instruments, but integrating it with the current activity, even through pictures and reference to the external places: to the open cellars and streets of Chianti Rufina and Pomino wines.
The visit starts before the museum: from the gate on the main road Tosco-Romagnola, which frames an avenue of cypresses with vine yards on both sides and ends with the view of Villa Poggio Reale. Therefore we arrive at the museum put up in the cellars of the villa, after crossing a scenographic and significant introduction: the classical Tuscan contiguity between culture and cultivation, the city and the countryside, the pompous owner's residence and concrete producing investments among which vine growing and wine making.
Coherently the museum treats the subject of the vine and the wine in the Sieve Valley at the crossing between the paper and the evocation: the paint to point technical-descriptive dimension is entrusted to the space dedicated to a thorough information and, above all, to the rich specialized library. The annexed wine library will be the place for wine-tasting and its relation to food.
In view there is the possibility of a qualified refreshment area. At least three vine yards have been purposely planted as experimental laboratories and research on the recovery of old cultivation. They have been trusted to the care of a local producer.
The tour opens with a vineyard, pictures and descriptions: at the centre a circular construction goes round continuously calling back (through art pictures and work tools) the flowing of time around the vines: the repetition of the seasons and the change of techniques. On the sides there are two rows of vines: blown up pictures and attested by objects belonging to different times and completed by "leaves and bunches of grapes" containing texts and pictures. The visitor can "harvest" variegated information from the proclamations of the Grand Dukes to words in dialect in the memory of the farmers, from files to manuals of "the Georgofili".
The space concludes by calling the attention to the innovated work by Vittorio Albizi in the last century, and with the protection of slides and film (from the 20s to the 50s) centred on the character, also spectacular, of grape harvesting.

Tipologie diver...

Caratello

Fiaschi nudi

Fiasco di proba...

Then we enter the cellars: on one side there are tools and documents on the owner and industrial dimensions: on the other side the signs tied to the use of share-farmers. At the centre there is a restored vat, on which some openings have been made: to be able to smell, listen to sounds, see colours and words: allusive to the charming metamorphosis connected to the alcoholic fermentation. The essential stages of the works in the cellar today can be seen on video. A big wall wholly composed of flasks and bottles introduces the next space where the wine containers are protagonists. Therefore the visitor can see the reconstruction of a cooper's work shop: with tools products under construction. One can see as well the cycle of a flask: from the great production of "Del Vi no" factory (which one can see on the catalogue) to the works at home by the women who covered the flasks (can be seen on video).

The use and trade are represented in a strongly symbolic form. On the sides there are big "labels" which contain (they must be opened as doors) essential information, from the Etruscans to the present day, on the use and trade of wine. The centre of the room is occupied by a "box" which enlarges the proportions of the ones that contain Bordeaux type bottles: the visitor can enter finding a main maze where sounds and projection of pictures and colours evoke the sensations, even intoxicating, produced by wine. Behind the "box" the visitor can sit at a tavern table or at an office desk of the owner of the cellar to leaf through anthologies of pieces and curiosities relative to the two environments. The tour ends with a space, for individual investigation through papers, video and informative material.

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his offer is available for one year from the date of purchase. Ask to the ticket office of the first museum you visit!