THE PROMISE TO SERGIO, MY FATHER
Lemuria is a sensory indigo wine, born from the desire of my father, Sergio, to give the world a wine capable of awakening dormant souls and making people understand that wine is not just a substance to drink, but something unique, inspiring and something that unites. Yes, that was the promise I made to my father in 2014, a week before he left and passed away. It was 14.00 in the afternoon when Sergio came to me and said:
- Sergio: Andrea, you must make me a promise. You know that life is over for me, I only have a week left, but you must continue, and you have to promise me that you will make indigo wine again.
- Andrea: What is indigo wine dad?
- Sergio: Indigo wine is the wine of the family, it is the wine of our ancestors, it is the wine of our grandparents who took their grandchildren in their arms and all together around the fireplace drank wine. At the third sip they were all united, one family, one smile. This is indigo wine, a wine that unites souls, a wine that brings together, that makes disagreements and controversies disappear.
- Andrea: It's beautiful dad, this is a great challenge, but I promise you that I will make it happen, whatever the cost.
- Sergio: I'm proud of you Andrea, you know, this will bring us together and remove all the disagreements that have been created between us over the years, indigo wine will also unite us.
- Andrea: Yes, dad, I'm sure that's the case. Indigo wine will unite us and many other people who, tasting it, will feel once again one with the whole and in harmony with all the others.
- Sergio: It won't be easy, you will find hundreds of difficulties, but I believe in you and in your abilities, what does not destroy you, strengthens you and you know what I am referring to.
- Andrea: Yes, I know, thank you.
2013 was the last wine base we made together; we chose that as the beginning for LEMURIA.
THE AMETHYST CRYSTAL
Many years ago, I had a passion for crystals, and I bought one, a large Amethyst tip, deep purple and with various internal shades, something unique that I felt an integral part of me. Directly from Brazil, a crystal like few others. When we started making wine with my father in 2003, we came up with the idea of using amethyst crystal from time to time during winemaking and during the waxing moon phases. The wine, after the use of Amethyst, was always better, more fragrant and intense in color. At the time we used it from time to time, but I could not have known that it would later play a fundamental role in the creation of Lemuria indigo wine. I remember once reading about the Roman people, whose Senators loved to use amethyst crystals in wine to mitigate the effect of alcohol and be able to drink more of it without getting drunk. Perhaps legend or perhaps truth is not known, what is certain is that Amethyst in wine, changes it, makes it different or as we say makes it "Indigo".
THE WRITER HOMER AND THE SEA AT DUSK
Me and a philosopher, the same one who had tasted the first bottle of Luteraia 2009, my father's wine, were in front of the fireplace, here at Luteraia, with the first bottle of Lemuria 2013, not yet official. After a while, he tells me that this is Homer's wine, which the writer narrates in his works. The philosopher tells me that in small islands of Greece there was a tradition, that is, to produce wine like the indigo color resembling the chromatic notes of the sea at dusk. Since its origins, Greek culture considered wine a valuable nectar, reserved for special men, so much so that Homer already spoke of it as a product destined to accompany the deeds of heroes. Homer sings of the wine-coloured sea, "οἶνοψ πόντος", and after him numerous poets recall how wine and the sea share the same deep nuances. Even today in some small towns on the Greek islands, a wine made according to tradition is served, characterized by colourful indigo reflections, the same indigo with which the sea is tinged in the last moments of the day, which has inspired centuries of songs and works of poets. Indigo wine is the image of a past in which family and friends gathered around a table, near a crackling fire, sharing moments of sincerity between a word and others.
GREECE AND THE STORY OF DIONYSIUS AND AMETHYST
The word amethyst comes from the ancient Greek "amethystos" which means "not drunk". The origin of the belief that amethyst gave protection from the effects of alcohol is to be associated with the color of the gem which is like that of wine and the ancient Greco-Roman myth that is linked to it. The Greek myth tells that Dionysius while he was in the grip of the fumes of wine was insulted by a common mortal and angry by this, he promised to take revenge on the human race. To do this, he created ferocious tigers, to incite them against anyone he crossed in his path. Fate wanted Dionysius with his tigers to cross paths with the virgin Amethyst while she was on her way to pay homage to the temple of Artemis, her protector. At the sight of Dionysius and the tigers, Amethyst fled, and the God turned the beasts against them. As she ran away, the girl begged Artemis to protect her. Hearing Amethyst's prayers, the Goddess transformed the young woman into a statue of transparent quartz crystals that the tigers obviously could not attack. Dionysius then recovered from the fumes of alcohol, realized the impious act he had performed and the sacrifice of the girl, so he cried tears of wine that dyed the crystals. In homage to poor Amethyst, Dionysius also gave this stone the power to protect against the effects of alcohol
LEGEND OR REALITY, LEMURIA
Passion for crystals, love for the Greek tradition, oenologist in training, promise to my father Sergio and much more, many pieces of a single puzzle that increasingly led me in search of the origins of wine, of the first vine cultivated, of something that went beyond the obvious of a story told but perhaps not true. The pleasure of meditation and the ability to dream lucidly led me to live a unique experience that I still remember today. For many years I did not talk about it in these terms, because the world is not open to the new, everything that goes beyond the history books, considered true and authentic, is seen as illusory and fantastic, or esoteric or magical.
But perhaps it is not imagination that inspires the greatest works of human ingenuity? Here I am, sitting on the sofa of Luteraia while I hold the bottle of Lemuria in my hands, I fall asleep and start dreaming. We are around 2016, and I still don't know how to keep my father's promise and make indigo wine again. You can take what I write as fantasy, as a narrated story or as my experience, what matters is what Lemuria represents. With the bottle in my hand, at a certain point I began to live the dream, in another place, familiar but unknown, something that I had only had the opportunity to know in books.
Shortly thereafter a graceful voice whispers inside me and says: "Lemuria, you are in Lemuria". I had already been to a similar place other times but as far as I remember it was Atlantis, while now the voice spoke to me of Lemuria. Here I understand the two great continents that have disappeared, which existed 36,000 years ago. Two great peoples, the Atlanteans were dedicated to the technological culture linked to mental potential, while the Lemurians were the best that can offer symbiosis with nature, mental faculties linked to passion, sexuality and contact with the elements. Of Lemuria today, an ancient continent in the Pacific Ocean, only the remains remain on Easter Island, whose Dolmens and Menhirs are the memory of this ancient civilization. What appeared to my eyes was wonderful, I cannot describe it for how magnificent I could observe in those moments. Everything was perfect, beings about 2.50 meters tall, reddish complexion, long hair well groomed, half-naked. I could say that the movie Avatar was inspired by the ancient legend of Lemuria. The environment was harmonious, houses built in symbiosis with nature, impossible to understand where a house ended and where a tree, or a rock, or a stream began.
All in perfect combination of elements. The atmosphere was almost magical, I couldn't believe what I was experiencing, then at a certain point I saw an area not far away and I saw something familiar, they were vines. Different from how we are used to seeing them normally. They were 2-meter-high saplings with a long trunk, then 3 or 4 branches branched off at the top, we will call them spurs today, and then many fruiting heads that harmoniously descended downwards. A sort of pergola of green vines whose bunches harmoniously showed themselves underneath, large, purple, rich, sumptuous, as if they were saying you grasp and rejoice in the delicacy with which we are imbued. The sensations of wonder followed one after the other, what my eyes captured was something unique, a vision that I will never forget. Those bunches were swollen, full, the skin perfect, as if perfection had kissed them. Rich vegetation above the bunches, large, round, lightly lanced leaves with thick hair. The trunk was a turgid, imposing brown, I think the vines were no less than 40 years old. No metal cables, just harmonious wooden structures, in complete symbiosis with the screws. Children played under the vines; life flowed under those prosperous clusters.
At a certain point time began to flow faster, and there I was, harvesting, strictly by hand, the bunches cut with a tool like a small crescent in the shape of a moon, were then placed in cone-shaped wicker baskets. Wicker backpacks, full of these bunches. The grape harvesters, these majestic men, unloaded the bunches of grapes into large cisterns made of amethyst quartz stone. The women separated the berries from the stalks. A meticulous and wonderful work, smiles everywhere, songs, dances. The separated grapes were then taken to other tanks always made of carved Amethyst Quartz stone. I think they were made of crystal, but I can't really say the material. Here, the women in a circle always stepped on the grains with their feet, whose fingers, I remember even now, were all the same long. The grape juice flowed in this way into other cisterns always made of excavated stone and then the women always collected the pressed part with their feet and put it inside the stone container with the grape juice inside. Time has become faster, and the scenery has changed, and here I find myself in a large room with many jars inside, I think terracotta with a strange lid, but which reminded me of my amethyst. Yes, the jars contained wine, and the lid was made of amethyst stone. I look inside and see some wine and from the lid a long amethyst crystal, infused in the wine itself.
A Lemurian nearby takes a cup of this wine, the cup was made of transparent crystal, like our common glass of water. The ruby red color with strong indigo reflections, it seemed that the wine spoke from how vital it was. As he turns it, he says that it is a sensory wine, I get excited and moved. The Lemurian then takes a large crystal container, fills it with this wine and gives it to many people sitting there. Everyone drinks, closes their eyes and enters meditation, it almost seems that their vital energy expands to the point of no longer defining the limit between their vitality and their physical body.
Here out of nowhere a voice speaks to me and tells me:
"We are in Lemuria, but you have understood this. It is here that the first grape vine and the first wine were born. A sensory indigo wine, able for those who taste it to reactivate the love for life, able to reactivate all our 6 senses. A nectar, an elixir of life, which transcends the body and brings those who taste it into a state of expanded consciousness, so that they can live united with the whole, and feel an essential part of creation. It is good for you to know that the vine was brought to the West by the Vikings, and you know the later in history. No one knows anything about Lemuria anymore, a people, a culture so rich and in symbiosis with nature, whose values for life echo in every human being on this planet. The wine of Lemuria had so many properties, it was impossible to define what they were, it was easier for those who drank it to let the wine do the rest, a magic made simple by the wise work and care of the people of Lemuria."
I am ecstatic to hear these words and suddenly I wake up with a start and find myself back on the sofa with my bottle in my hand. There is that day I decided that that wine would be called Lemuria, and that in addition to the promise of my father, who, without knowing it, had heard Lemuria's voice in him, I felt that the road to be able to do it was not far away, difficult certainly, but not impossible. The various elements were coming together, my father's promise of indigo wine, the narrative of Homer's heroes and indigo wine, the use of amethyst; everything was connecting for Lemuria to come to life. A way, mine, to echo in that wine the ancient and wise tradition of making wine of the ancient people of Lemuria.
BIRTH OF LEMURIA
Lemuria is thus born at Luteraia, through the skilful processing of wine with amethyst crystals, spontaneous yeasts, controlled fermentation, conscious pumping over and perfect delestage. Soft pressing and union between free-run wine and pressed wine. Addition of the minimum amount of metabisulphite. Long aging in wood for at least 18 months and then in the bottle to age slowly until its aroma, its aromas and its bouquet in the mouth are ready to be felt by those who taste it. The Lemuria thus born, is ready to make its journey and be drunk by anyone who finds in this wine the ancestral memory of its time lived in Lemuria. A wine now produced in Tuscany, on the last hill below Montepulciano. Lemuria comes to life in our 3-hectare vineyard, where different types of soil follow one another, now fat, now stony and then clayey and then still fat. Fine skeleton with the presence of clay and ochre-colored stones that give the characteristic color, precisely of "cooper" as my father called it.
Once harvested, the grapes are then separated from their stalk and the lightly pressed grains are placed in the steel vat. Each grape variety is vinified separately to have tanks of Sangiovese, Merlot, and Canaiolo, Mammolo and Malvasia Bianca. A previously prepared cuvée foot is inoculated into the freshly filled tanks. Our foot is prepared a few days before using the best grapes. Once spontaneous fermentation is active, then this foot will be placed in the tanks of freshly harvested and destemmed grapes.
This is how the fermentation process begins, with spontaneous yeasts and dry ice, for a better extraction of the color from the skins and preserve the wine from alterations and acetic hints.
USE OF THE GEODE D'AMETHISTA
Here we come to the use of the Amethyst Geode, which is strictly placed in a container in which the wine is made to flow which is then remounted over the fermenting skins. The crystal is used in the phases of the waxing moon and on flower and fruit days of the biodynamic calendar.
It may be superstition, it may be a coincidence, but in these moments, I have the feeling that the world of wine and that of crystals merge. The crescent moon affects liquids and so I feel that wine expands, becomes more receptive, more magnetic, able to absorb information more easily. Here the flower and fruit days of the biodynamic calendar are the moments in which the wine expresses its greatest power on an organoleptic level, its best qualities are completely expanded, like a perfect symphony with instruments that resonate in unison.
Here it is time to use Amethyst, which in my experience echoes the memory of Lemuria in the wine and changes the wine from red to indigo, I cannot explain this thing scientifically, but I feel it in me. Something changes in the depths of the wine. It is as if amethyst allowed the wine to remain in its state of maximum organoleptic expression, so that it can express the best of itself over time. At the end of fermentation and subsequent pressing, the wine is left to rest in steel tanks for a few months, this is the moment when we insert a smaller amethyst crystal, and keep it there for a few lunar cycles, so that the first information conveyed by the crystal in the wine is kept forever for the duration of that wine until it is tasted by someone. At the end of this process, our wine is no longer red but indigo and begins its journey to become sensorial, as that of Lemuria was 36,000 years ago.
AGING AND AGING
The indigo wine is thus ready to go into wood and will remain here for at least 18 months. We use barriques, Tonneaux and large wooden barrels so as to give a pleasant spicy note to our wine, the right tannic balance, so as to release over time all the tertiary scents of which it will be capable. After aging in wooden barrels, the wine returns to steel for a few months, and here again we use amethyst to echo the memory of Lemuria in the wine. Finally, in the bottle, in its precious casket, where it will remain for the duration of its life. I prefer to leave the Lemuria for at least 4 years in the bottle before making it known, because it is the minimum time for this delicacy to reach the beginning of its full maturity.
HER DRESS, LABEL AND CAPSULE
Here we are at the end of 2019, the first Lemuria is ready, we choose its label strictly made on the Fibonacci scale so that the harmony of nature resonates in this wine. Each color is not chosen at random; the cyclamen of its label and the color of its capsule recall the purity of the color of freshly fermented wine. Moreover, this color reminds me of what I had seen in Lemuria, everything seemed to be soaked in this color, the women adorned their faces with this color taken from the containers that they had seen the wine fermenting inside. Everything must be harmonious in Lemuria. Its central logo, a mandala, is inspired by Lemuria, passion and love of life. A mandala that expresses the essence of our existence.
SENSORY INDIGO WINE
Finally, after a long wait, we have our first bottle of Lemuria 2013. A wine inspired by my father Sergio, by all the people who helped me to make it, by Homer who tells of his presence in Greece, by Lemuria and its traditions.
Once opened it begins to make itself known, it is not a wine for everyone but for many. Lemuria chooses who to drink from and who to sell from. This wine seeks out sensitive people who love life who believe in the same values that existed at the time of ancient Lemuria. Something that cannot be explained in words but that can be perceived every time you taste Lemuria. A timeless wine, today we are in 2024, Lemuria is 11 years old and still makes people talk about it, splendid in every aspect, both olfactory and organoleptic. Lemuria is a message for this world, a yearning that stimulates us to remember our symbiotic nature with human values, with what we are in the depths of our essence. Lemuria is not a wine but a life experience. Anyone who has tasted it has pleasantly noticed that it is easy to drink it, it is as if he intelligently knows who is drinking it and turns into the glass, so that he can express his best. A chameleon-like wine that can be harmoniously combined with any culinary delicacy, a gift for the nose and the palate.
Those who know Lemuria through me, have certainly tried at least the first 3 sensory experiences:
- Marriage, stealing perfumes and then drinking Lemuria, feeling if marriage is born between us and Lemuria, and between Lemuria and us.
- The sensory experience with food, tasting Lemuria by combining it with the most disparate ingredients, it will be able to expertly "always play a different symphony for each combination, but perfect every time". An adaptogenic wine that will be able to adapt its amphoteric quality in every culinary combination. He will never overpower the food but will always make sure that the essence of what you taste is the protagonist.
- Exchange of glasses, yes you got it right, at some point have the tasting person exchange glasses, and the wonder will be sovereign. In fact, each glass is different, because Lemuria is intelligent and in the time of its maturation it has acquired the ability to adapt to the essence of those who taste it, so that everyone can feel themselves through it. Veritas Wine.
UNIQUENESS OF LEMURIA
The world of wine is vast and colourful, millions of labels, thousands of producers, all united by the alchemy of transforming grapes into nectar of the Gods, wine. Lemuria is not the best wine in the world, but it is one of a kind. As from ancient Lemuria, our wine is a message to the world, for all those who do not just want to taste something wonderful but return to being the conscious expression of their beauty, their spirit and their essence.