Antinori nel Chianti Classico Architectural Tour

How to Complete

5 steps curated by Wine Memories

1. 🍷 1

   Descend the Spiral Staircase Into the Hill

   architecture $$

   Seven years of construction and a budget that ballooned to more than $130 million — over $180 million with furnishings and equipment.

   Marco Casamonti buried a winery inside a Chianti hillside and planted its roof, so the building barely exists from the road; the Cor-Ten spiral staircases are how you move through it.

   📍 WHERE: Antinori nel Chianti Classico, Via Cassia per Siena 133, Loc. Bargino, 50026 San Casciano Val di Pesa (FI).

   💡 WHAT: The weathered-steel spiral staircase linking the production levels, and the terracotta vaults it hangs in.

   🎯 HOW: Book the Tinaia Tour at antinori.it — €50 adult, €10 ages 7–17, free under 6, about 90 minutes, ending with three wines (Villa Antinori Chianti Classico Riserva, Cont'Ugo Bolgheri Rosso, Bramasole Cortona Syrah) in the museum's glass-walled room over the family's art collection. Stop midway on the stair and shoot straight up. Payments are non-refundable.

   🔄 BACKUP: If tours are full, take a 45-minute seated tasting instead — 'Tuscan Stories' or 'Vintners', €30, 18+ only, in a private room beside the Wine Shop. Do not just turn up: for safety reasons the estate says entrance is not guaranteed without a booking.

   🍷 Log Memory
2. 📜 2

   Count the Generations in the Museum

   history $$

   Giovanni di Piero Antinori joined the Florentine vintners' guild in 1385. Twenty-six generations later the family still owns the place.

   Antinori dates itself to 1385, when Giovanni di Piero Antinori became a member of the Arte Fiorentina dei Vinattieri — the Florentine vintners' guild — and the family counts twenty-six generations since.

   📍 WHERE: The on-site museum, on the Tinaia Tour route.

   💡 WHAT: The museum rooms and the family's art collection, visible through the glass wall of the tasting room.

   🎯 HOW: Ask your guide where 1385 and the twenty-six generations sit in the museum's telling, and ask about Piero Antinori and the first Tignanello vintage of 1970 — the first Sangiovese aged in small oak barrels, which gave up its DOC to do it and stayed table wine until IGT arrived in 1994. The museum is a set of rooms and an art collection rather than one timeline display, so let the guide lead instead of hunting for a single exhibit.

   🔄 BACKUP: If your group doesn't reach the museum, antinori.it/en/family/family-in-depth/ carries the same 1385 date and twenty-six-generation count.

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3. 🍷 3

   Taste Tignanello Where It Is Poured, Not Where It Is Grown

   Optional

   wine $$$$

   Tignanello comes from a 77-hectare parcel at Tenuta Tignanello between the Greve and Pesa valleys — not from Bargino. Bargino is where you can drink it.

   The 1970 Tignanello was the first Sangiovese aged in small oak barrels, and it surrendered its DOC to do it — table wine until 1994, when IGT finally existed. It is grown at the Tignanello estate, a single parcel of about 77 hectares at 350–400 m between the Greve and Pesa valleys; it is not made at the Bargino winery you are standing in.

   📍 WHERE: Antinori nel Chianti Classico, Loc. Bargino, San Casciano Val di Pesa.

   💡 WHAT: Tignanello Toscana IGT in the glass.

   🎯 HOW: Two published routes, and only two. The CRU Tour, €190 per adult, about two and a half hours plus lunch at Rinuccio 1180, adults only, four wines tasted (Cervaro della Sala, Badia a Passignano Gran Selezione, Pian delle Vigne Brunello, Tignanello) plus three more paired with lunch. Or a tailor-made private Experience — the 'Wine Experience' pours Tignanello and Solaia — requested in writing to visite@antinorichianticlassico.it, prices on request.

   🔄 BACKUP: Tignanello is not sold by the glass anywhere on site, and the CRU Tour is the only fixed-price format that pours it. If €190 is too much, the €75 Bottaia Tour (€15 up to 17) pours Badia a Passignano Chianti Classico Gran Selezione, the family's other Sangiovese benchmark, in the suspended glass tasting room.

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4. ⛰️ 4

   Walk the Roof That Is a Vineyard

   adventure $$

   The roof is a working vineyard. You reach it on the tour, not on your own.

   The reason you cannot see this winery from the Via Cassia is that its roof is planted — the vineyard continues straight over the cellar.

   📍 WHERE: The rooftop vineyard, on the Tinaia Tour route.

   💡 WHAT: Vines growing on top of the production levels you have just walked through, with the Val di Pesa beyond.

   🎯 HOW: It is included in the Tinaia Tour (€50 adult / €10 ages 7–17, about 90 minutes) — ask your guide to pause up there and look back down. The roof is not open to the public outside a booked visit and there is no path up from the road, so the tour is the way in. Getting here without a car: Autolinee Toscane line 370 (Poggibonsi–Barberino Val d'Elsa–San Donato–Tavarnelle–San Casciano–Firenze) stops at BARGINO-ANTINORI, but services are not timed to tour slots — check at-bus.it and book a tour slot that fits the bus, not the other way round.

   🔄 BACKUP: The Bottaia Tour (€75 / €15, about 2.5 hours) and the CRU Tour (€190) cover the same architecture with more wine. Winery hours: April–October daily 10:00–18:30; November–March Mon–Fri 10:00–17:30 and Sat–Sun 10:00–18:00; closed 13–16 August 2026 along with the wine shop and Rinuccio 1180.

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5. 🍷 5

   Lunch with the View at Rinuccio 1180

   Optional

   wine $$$

   Named for the first Antinori to make wine in Florence in 1180.

   Book Rinuccio 1180 restaurant SEPARATELY from the tour (not included). Book on antinori.it at least 1 week ahead, request terrace seating. Order the truffle pasta if in season. Wines by the glass let you taste across the Antinori empire. The view of the Chianti hills is the real prize - this is the Instagram shot everyone wants.

   🍷 Log Memory

Insider Tips

• ✦

  Book the first slot — the winery opens at 10:00 and the spiral staircase is emptiest before the day fills

• ✦

  Tinaia Tour is €50 adult, €10 ages 7–17, free under 6, about 90 minutes, three wines. €30 is the price of the separate 45-minute seated tastings ("Tuscan Stories" and "Vintners"), which are 18+ only

• ✦

  Tignanello is poured on the €190 CRU Tour or on a tailor-made private visit (visite@antinorichianticlassico.it). There is no Tignanello by the glass and no "premium tasting" — the €75 Bottaia Tour is the mid-tier if €190 is too steep

• ✦

  Rinuccio 1180 books separately on +39 055 2359720, lunch 12:00–16:00 on winery days; pets are not allowed anywhere in the facility

• ✦

  Cellar, wine shop and Rinuccio 1180 are all closed 13–16 August 2026. Entry is not guaranteed without a booking, and payments are non-refundable on every format