Torre dei Beati

The People

Torre dei Beati is run by husband and wife Fausto Papetti and Adriana Galasso Cerulli, who formally founded the estate in 1999 and have farmed it organically ever since. But the vineyards themselves go back further than the estate's paperwork: Adriana's father, Rocco Cerulli, had already been tending these same hillside plots in the Loreto Aprutino hills since 1972, more than two decades before Torre dei Beati existed as a named, functioning winery, and years before most of the quality-focused estates that now define Abruzzo's reputation had even started. Fausto runs the cellar and shapes the estate's winemaking style; Adriana carries that older family history on the land, the generation of site knowledge her father built simply by working the same slopes, season after season, for the better part of thirty years before the couple took over.

When Fausto and Adriana formally took the estate over, farming organically wasn't a new direction: it was how the vineyard had already been worked under Rocco, now simply made official and, in time, certified. Over the two and a half decades since, the couple have built a reputation for meticulous, patient winemaking that respects the character of each individual growing season rather than smoothing vintages into a house style. The estate's name, Torre dei Beati, "Tower of the Blessed," is a nod to the historic agricultural landscape around it, where ruined watchtowers and ancient olive groves have shared the same hillsides as vines for centuries. It's a small detail, but it places the estate inside a much longer story of this land being farmed, long before organic became a certification anyone needed to apply for.

The Land

The estate sits in Contrada Poggioragone, just outside Loreto Aprutino, a hilltown in Pescara province that's historically known for its olive oil at least as much as its wine. Altitude here takes the edge off the summer heat, and the clay-limestone soil beneath the vines puts just enough stress on them to concentrate flavour while preserving the natural acidity that marks the best Abruzzo wines. Loreto Aprutino sits roughly 30 kilometres inland from Pescara and the coast, far enough to escape the most intense Adriatic heat, but close enough to still catch the daily exchange between sea air and mountain air that keeps the grapes both ripe and fresh rather than jammy.

Montepulciano is the main red grape here, used for both the still red and the Cerasuolo; Trebbiano and Pecorino fill out the whites. Beyond the vine rows, this is still visibly olive country: the same hills carry old olive groves and the remains of watchtowers that gave the estate its name.

How They Work

Torre dei Beati has farmed organically, no synthetic pesticides or fertilizers, since the estate's founding in 1999, years before organic certification became the industry-wide norm it is today for quality-focused Italian producers. In the cellar, fermentations run on indigenous yeasts, the wild yeast already present on the grapes and in the winery itself, rather than commercial cultures added in, and cellar treatments are kept deliberately minimal.

This isn't the zero-sulphur end of the natural wine movement; it's a quieter, more classical discipline. The idea is to let organic farming and a light hand in the cellar do the work, and let the vintage and the specific site show through in the glass rather than being polished away. That's also why the wines reward ageing more than immediate, easy drinking on release.

That philosophy shows most clearly in how they make Rosa-ae. Most Cerasuolo is made pale and light, meant to be drunk young and cold. Torre dei Beati does the opposite on purpose: the Montepulciano grapes are vinified with more skin contact than is typical for the style, giving the wine a depth of colour and a real tannin structure that's unusual for a rosé. It's the deliberate choice that turns Cerasuolo, in their hands, from an aperitivo into a wine you'd put next to a proper meal.

The Wines

Rosa-ae, the Cerasuolo d'Abruzzo DOC, Italy's regulated appellation zone for the style, is the flagship: deep salmon-ruby in the glass, savoury rather than fruity-sweet, structured enough for a full meal, and built to reward a few years in the cellar. The Gambero Rosso win and Tre Bicchieri rating, both in 2020, put an Abruzzo rosé, a category rarely taken this seriously, at the top of Italy's wine world that year.

Cocciappazza, the top red, is a Montepulciano d'Abruzzo DOC named for a traditional Abruzzese harvest game whose name loosely translates to "broken pot." Extended time on the skins and careful ageing give it dark fruit, a mineral edge, and real staying power. In the same vintage cycle that brought Rosa-ae its Gambero Rosso award, Cocciappazza received three stars from Luigi Veronelli's guide, one of Italy's two most respected annual wine publications alongside Gambero Rosso itself, putting Torre dei Beati in a small group of Abruzzo estates recognised by both guides at once.

Bianchi Grilli per la Testa, "white crickets in the head," an Italian expression for someone full of fanciful ideas and a winemaker's wry joke at his own expense, is the Trebbiano, fermented to bring out the grape's saline, herbal side instead of being played safe as an everyday, forgettable white. Bflorida, a Pecorino, adds the floral lift and aromatic character that's made the variety increasingly sought-after across central Abruzzo in recent years, a newer name on the estate's list, but one that fits the same instinct to let each grape show what it can actually do.

Why Visit

Torre dei Beati sits in a working agricultural contrada outside town, not on a tourist route, so visits are arranged directly with the estate in advance. This is a small, family-run cellar, without the infrastructure for casual walk-ins. Loreto Aprutino itself is worth the detour regardless of whether a tasting is arranged: it's home to the Museo delle Ceramiche di Castelli, the Castello Chiola, and a cluster of historic olive oil mills that speak to the same long agricultural tradition that shaped the estate's own name and its surrounding hillsides. A visit here pairs naturally with time spent exploring the town itself.