The Stazione Leopolda filled quickly – journalists, buyers, and wine lovers from across Italy converge on Florence each February for the Chianti Classico Collection -200-odd producers under one roof with a black rooster on every label.
The energy inside was particular, focused and territorial, in the way that only events built around a single appellation can be.
What struck me the most, working through the tables, was how consistently the wines spoke about place rather than process. The winemaking has receded into the background and in this appellation that feels like a genuine achievement. Oak is increasingly a seasoning rather than a statement, extraction is controlled, and the wines invite you to drink them rather than admire them from a respectful distance. What remains, expressed in all its local variation, is Sangiovese, shaped by altitude, soil, and aspect into something that could only come from this unique patch of Tuscany.
The UGAs: Terroir as Argument
The growing legibility of the Unità Geografiche Aggiuntive (UGA) was the dominant theme of the 2026 Collection. What began, some years ago, as a theoretical exercise, a formal subdivision of the appellation into eleven sub-zones, has become, vintage after vintage, a genuine critical tool. The Gran Selezione wines no longer merely indicate their UGA on the label, they argue for it in the glass.
The contrast between zones was clear and consistent. The cooler, higher-altitude areas delivered wines with an almost nervous energy (lifted aromatics, fine tannins, a freshness that runs like a thread through the palate). The warmer sectors offered instead, more body and depth of fruit, without losing the backbone that makes Chianti Classico what it is. Moving from table to table was, in the most literal sense, a journey across different landscapes gathered into a single hall.
Of the sub-zones tasted, Gaiole impressed the most. Across producers and categories, the wines shared a recognisable character: subtle floral notes, firm but ripe tannins, and a high acidity that speaks directly to ageing potential.
Gran Selezione: Ambition Redirected
The Gran Selezione category has matured in ways that were not inevitable. For a period of time, it risked becoming a vehicle for concentration and cellar ambition with Sangiovese being dressed in clothes it did not quite fit. However, the 2026 Collection showed a different path; producers are now using the category to translate specific plots into unique sensory profiles, and the results are the most persuasive Gran Selezione tasted so far.
The shift is significant. These are not wines defined by what was done to them in the cellar, but by where they came from, and that distinction, once understood in the glass, changes how you read the entire appellation.
Annata and Riserva: Clarity at Every Level
The Annata and Riserva categories showed a consistency that reflects how much the region has changed in less than a decade. The direction across both levels is convergent: freshness as a structural element, purity of fruit, and a drinkability that does not come at the expense of complexity.
How to reach this goal varies from producer to producer: whole-cluster fermentation, longer or shorter maceration, different positions on native yeasts, but the common ambition is clear – less intervention.
Wines that Stayed with Me
Chianti Classico 2022 – Castello di Cacchiano
95% Sangiovese, 3% Malvasia Nera, 2% Colorino
A medium ruby wine in colour, that on the nose, was almost pastoral with wild cherry, dried herbs, and a breath of Mediterranean scrubland on a warm afternoon. On the palate, it was precise and frank: bright acidity, tannins that grip without bruising, a finish that lingers with a pleasing, a faintly saline tang. A wine that does not try to impress; it simply belongs to its terroir.
Chianti Classico Il Palei 2024 – Villa a Sesta
100% Sangiovese
Vivid ruby with a youthful violet rim that makes the 2024 vintage’s freshness immediately visible. The nose was clean and direct: black cherry, redcurrant, a flash of fresh plum, with a purity that speaks to careful fruit selection. On the palate, it was all tension and forward energy; the tannins were silky but present, the acidity kept everything taut, and the finish echoed long after the glass was empty. This vintage has given this wine an almost electric vitality.
Chianti Classico Riserva 2022 – Le Fonti
90% Sangiovese, 7% Merlot, 3% Cabernet Sauvignon
A Riserva with one foot in tradition, the other in modernity. The international varieties did not announce themselves, the Merlot quietly rounded the mid-palate, the Cabernet lent a cedar-and-cassis backbone, but Sangiovese called the shots. The nose offered ripe cherry and blackcurrant framed by a cool minty lift and a whisper of orange zest. The palate was generous but disciplined, and the long finish of dried herbs said something clear about the ageing potential.
Chianti Classico Riserva Brolio 2023 – Ricasoli
100% Sangiovese
This Riserva carried the history of the Ricasoli family without being weighed down by it. The wine showed a brooding nose of dark cherry, blueberry, and tobacco leaf, with woodsmoke drifting in the background. On the palate, the acidity was high and cutting, the tannins ripe but assertive. This was a wine that rewards patience. The savoury, herb-laced finish suggests it will reward even more in the future.
Chianti Classico Gran Selezione Badia a Passignano 2023 – Antinori
100% Sangiovese
From one of the appellation’s most iconic single vineyards, a Gran Selezione that commanded attention from the first pour. The nose led you in two ways, floral (rose, lavender) and earthy (coffee, liquorice) with a thread of orange peel; these complimented rather than competed with each other. On the palate, the high acidity drove the structure while ripe, well-integrated tannins added density without weight. The finish was very long and savoury: a wine that did not merely reflect its terroir, it argued for it with conviction.
Chianti Classico Gran Selezione La Prima 2022 – Castello Vicchiomaggio
90% Sangiovese, 10% Merlot
The Merlot here was not a concession to international taste, it was a conscious choice. Where straight Sangiovese might show sharper edges, this blend achieved a seamless mid-palate, the plum and black cherry lending depth to a nose already alive with rose, redcurrant and a curl of orange zest. Fine-grained tannins and vibrant acidity framed a very long finish. Greve in a confident, polished register, a Gran Selezione that earned its category.
Chianti Classico Gran Selezione Vigneto Bellavista 2021 – Castello di Ama
80% Sangiovese, 20% Malvasia Nera
Ama’s Bellavista vineyard produced one of the appellation’s most distinctive Gran Selezione, and this wine did not disappoint. The Malvasia Nera was the key; it brought a perfumed, almost otherworldly quality to the nose with pomegranate, dried rose, a balsamic thread alongside the darker blackberry and tobacco. The palate was full and structured, the tannins smooth but substantial, with the acidity cutting through cleanly. The finish was long and savoury, and completely distinctive of its place.
Conversations Worth Having
The topics that came up most consistently were about farming rather than winemaking: soil health, altitude as a response to warming seasons, canopy management in increasingly unpredictable vintages. The tone was one of adaptation, one of an appellation that has faced difficult harvests before and knows how to respond.
At Castello di Volpaia’s stand, the conversation turned immediately to massal selection. Their flagship Gran Selezione, Il Puro Vigna Casanova, is built around a Sangiovese clone grown on the estate since the 1940s; an indigenous genetic identity that is, as the producer made clear, entirely their own. It is the kind of detail that does not appear on a label but shapes everything in the glass; a specificity of origin that no appellation regulation can replicate and no competitor can copy.
This is where the real story of the 2026 Collection lives: the gathering of individual decisions about which vines to propagate, which plots to pick first, which moments to resist the temptation to intervene.
In Coda: The Chianti Classico’s Sweet Wine
The right way to end a day at the Chianti Classico Collection, it turned out, was not with another Gran Selezione.
Passing the Vin Santo del Chianti Classico tasting area on the way out, I stopped longer than I had planned. Here was a category that has faced its own crisis (falling consumption, changing taste, a style that once felt timeless and then suddenly old-fashioned), and now is attempting, with genuine seriousness, to find its footing again.
The wines on show were more refined and more restrained than in the past, reaching towards a modern palate without abandoning the oxidative depth and a dried-fruit intensity that makes the style worth preserving.
Resilience and reinvention, expressed in amber rather than ruby, but the same underlying commitment to place, grape, and tradition that defines the entire category.
Chianti Classico has not finished evolving, but it has found a direction it can believe in.