Italian photographer Oliviero Toscani is known as the mercurial father of late 20th-century “shockvertising.” During his time as artistic director of clothing brand Benetton, his provocative ads depicted a priest and nun in a passionate embrace, an AIDS activist on his deathbed, death row inmates and much more.
Less known is that Toscani and his family have had a 40-year adventure in farming and winemaking in the Tuscan countryside.
Today Toscani, retired at 82, still lives on his largely wild, 400-acre property in Casale Marittimo, just outside Bolgheri. But the farm, which includes more than 20 acres of vineyards, is now closely run by his son, Rocco, who a decade ago brought his own, often-defiant personality to Toscani.
“Wine is the closest thing I know to sex,” says Rocco, 44, showing the edginess that runs in his family. “Everybody does it. There are no rules. It’s so personal.”
A charismatic, broad-shouldered father of two, Rocco has plunged into every aspect of the farm—from working in the vineyards and cellar to caring for its horses and raising and racing homing pigeons.
On an early summer day, he tools around hillside vineyards rising to 1,150 feet in altitude in his tiny, 30-year-old Fiat. He contrasts the estate’s terroirs to those in the generally lower-lying Bolgheri region, a couple of miles to the south. “The soils are pretty much the same, but we have the Volterra Valley here that brings in cold winds that make a huge difference,” he says. “In October, when we harvest in the morning, we have frost on the leaves. I wouldn’t call it ice wine, but it’s the closest thing here.”
Taking Cues from Bolgheri Pioneers
The Toscanis’ wine story involves celebrity, egos, generational conflict, a revolution in farming and wine styles, and even a bit of rodeo.
The story begins in 1968 when Milan-born Oliviero bought his first plot and house here in Casale Marittimo. “He was a hippie kid from the city,” explains Rocco. “He became passionate about horses and planted 4,000 olive trees.”
With his third and current wife, Norwegian model Kirsti Moseng, Oliviero moved to the farm in the late 1970s to start a family. Rocco grew up traveling the world with his parents and returning home to the farm; there he became an avid horseman, which led to competing in Western reining competitions in Texas and elsewhere.
Wine came into the picture in the late 1990s, when, as Rocco puts it, “Angelo Gaja came to dinner.”
Shortly after Gaja founded Ca’ Marcanda in Bolgheri, he befriended Oliviero. These two volcanoes of energy hit it off, according to both their families. Oliviero brought Gaja up to a piece of land at the top of the farm that was planted with fruit trees. Gaja, says Rocco, was enthusiastic about the potential for grapevines there and even offered to buy it. Oliviero figured if it was that good he would make wine himself.
Though Oliviero knew nothing about viticulture, he got advice from friends like Gaja, as well as Bolgheri’s Piermario Meletti Cavallari (founder of Grattamacco) and Michele Satta. He also hired Tuscan consulting enologist Attilio Pagli.
After planting the first vineyard in 2001, Oliviero made the first vintage of his Super Tuscan, “OT,” five years later, blending Syrah, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot. Wine Spectator senior editor Bruce Sanderson described it as a “meaty style” more than a decade later, when he blind tasted the OT 2012 (93 points $56).
But there were problems on the farm, which was losing money. “At a certain point, I said, ‘If I don’t run the farm, I’ll have to sell it or rent it,’” remembers Rocco, who had become a successful fashion photographer in his own right. “So I decided to save it.”
“I had a clear idea of how I wanted to manage the farm with ethics and organics,” he adds. “I continued a lot of stuff and threw out a lot of stuff. Mostly I threw out.”
After Rocco’s first wine tour of the U.S., in 2014, changes to the winemaking followed quickly. “When my father had gone to the States, he was a star in Italian restaurants, and no one criticized anything,” Rocco recalls with a shake of his head and a laugh. “But when I went, they lynched me. They criticized the barriques and the concentration and other things.”
Rebooting Toscani: New Techniques, More Wines and Fun
Rocco, who found the wines too heavy, went back to the drawing board with Pagli, deciding he wanted to make a range of fresher wines. He chose to ferment with indigenous yeasts, not use additives, reduce wood influence by aging in large oak casks, and to dump inky Petit Verdot from the estate altogether by regrafting those vines to Syrah.
“I had huge fights with my father,” he remembers. “He said, ‘Why are you taking out Petit Verdot—it’s nice.’ And I said, ‘Yes, flared pants were in too. But you don’t wear them anymore.’”
Another big change he made, starting with his first vintage in 2015, was to co-ferment the Syrah with small quantities of a white variety (a practice common in the Northern Rhône)—in this case Greco, to add fresh acidity to the Syrah-based reds, including OT.
Before Rocco took over, Toscani was making about 800 cases of the winery’s sole wine, OT. In the last decade, Rocco has grown production five-fold; the lineup now includes seven Costa Toscana IGT wines, topped by a more elegant version of OT, of which a mere 80 cases are now made. Four of his wines are Greco-lightened Syrahs, including the estate workhorse I Toscani, the cask-aged Vedomare Rosso, the amphora-fermented-and-aged Lumeo, and the bottle-fermented, pét-nat-style rosé Lolí. He also makes a Vedomare white from Greco and a pure Cabernet Franc called Vieni Via Con Me.
“I am convinced wine has to be a popular thing,” he says. “It’s like music. You don’t make aristocratic music. We have to be in the fun area.”
In that zone, on warm Friday evenings, Rocco and a local bar owner open the farm for a locally popular party of wine, cocktails, music, food and horseback riding. Dubbed Madama Rodeo, the event has a vibe that crosses coastal Tuscany with a Texas roadhouse.
A decade into the farm, Rocco is not yet content. He still has questions about his next moves—especially with his own kids, 15 and 10 years old, looking over his shoulder.
“I feel it’s my duty to keep this small place on earth in a good way,” he says. “Before I came here, I was doing great, but now I think I’m doing better.”
