The Castle of Grinzane Cavour

The first Regional Winehouse of Piedmont

The castle represents a unique witness for the history of Piedmontese viticulture.

During the XIX century the castle was acquired by the statesman Camillo Benso Count of Cavour who personally took care of testing the quality of those wines that later became the major Piedmontese red wines.

The castle, sentinel of Grinzane Cavour village, stands from a hill ridge between the municipality of Diano d’Alba and the valley of Talloria river near Gallo d’Alba. Finding information about “the laying of the first stone” is extremely difficult because of the little information found on this in the historical treaties. According to many historians, the construction of the original nucleus, composed of a central tower with its squared bottom, dates back to the XIV century. The castle is made of a compound with a parallelepiped palacium in the northern part and of another zone characterized by hanging turrets in the South.

The castle and its hill are now a centre of excellence for the knowledge and the promotion of the wine growing culture for the whole district of Langhe-Roero and Monferrato. It actually hosts the first Regional Winehouse of Piedmont and one of the most exhaustive ethnographic museums about the wine-making tradition of the Region.

The vineyard at the foot of the castle is an important research and testing centre on the Piedmontese wine-growing heritage and one of the biggest european collections of vines.