It is a year since I wrote to you about the publication of The Wines of Piemonte. It has been a full and exciting year. Here are the highlights in a review of the year:
The Classic Wine Library which published my book has a new home. The Académie du Vin Library bought the company, founded by the esteemed Stephen Spurrier. The big deal for us writers is that AVL has a much bigger staff including a marketing department. Managing Director, Hermione Ireland, leads and trots the globe, while former CWL’s Rebecca Clare continues with her expertise as Editorial Director.
Much of this year has been taken up with podcasts and presentations in some predictable–and some completely unpredictable–places.
Podcasts and presentations
Podcasts: these include with Tim Atkin MW on Cork Talk, Italian Wine Podcast in Verona, Jessica Dupuis’s Another Bottle Down, Mattia Scarpazza’s Looking into wine, WSET Diploma alumni and APWASI Wine Buzz (warning, this has video too ? but also had interesting questions about my photography!).
Presentations and tastings: I have been honoured to make presentations in a number of places. The first were in Turin and Alba. This was sort of predictable but it was a huge honour to talk to the regions’ producers in their own territories. The challenge in Turin and Alba was to do the presentations in Italian but that went well. Others were in London of course and, wait for it, Texas.
New York and Texsom Dallas: Given I had never been to the US before, it was amazing to get an invitation to present at the very high-quality event, Texsom, in August. This was definitely a highlight for this review of the year. I preceded this with a visit to New York including a day in the vineyards of Long Island, thanks to my WSET colleague, Caitlin Miller. Texas was hot of course, but a great experience with 600 knowledgeable people in attendance and a rich offering of seminars and wine tastings.
Award news!
OIV book award for The Wines of Piemonte: The year was then crowned by winning an OIV award for my book, which led to a visit to Lisbon to receive the award. (The OIV is the world wine authority, setting standards and commissioning scientific studies to support the wine industry.) So it turns out that writing about the wines of Piemonte can take you to Dallas and Lisbon!
Looking back on 2023–24, it has been a remarkable year, full of new and rewarding experiences. For next year, I will be leading the Wine Scholar Guild’s week-long educational tour of Piemonte. I have enjoyed the wine tourism I have done with informal groups in the past. This takes it to a whole new level.
The final phase of the year involved starting a project with Nebbia e Luce. This company specialises in importing Nebbiolo-based wines. Its USP is that it stores the wines for five years before release, making fully ready-to-drink wines available to the public. The company has commissioned me to write profiles of its wineries for its publicity material. In December, I started this work with a week in Alto Piemonte. This is exactly the sort of work I had hoped for when I wrote The Wines of Piemonte.
As always, thank you for your support. And if you have a lead for an event on the wines of Piemonte, do get in touch! What will the review of the year for 2024–25 look like?
