When choosing regions for our inaugural Italy Report, Piemonte and Tuscany were obvious choices – based on, if nothing else, eye-popping price appreciation – but the next choice was less so. Fifteen years earlier, the answer might have been clearer; the trinity of Barolo (and Barbaresco), Brunello and Amarone was largely intact, even if Amarone was in fact a relatively recent phenomenon. However, the intervening years have seen Amarone challenged by regions like Etna, Taurasi (mainly Mastroberardino plus Feudi) and – somewhat unexpectedly – Abruzzo (almost exclusively Pepe plus Valentini), though Veneto remains the Italian region outside Piemonte and Tuscany with the most traded wines on Liv-Ex. Whether it can maintain that position depends on what happens next.

Read more: The Amarone della Valpolicella Report

As was repeated frequently at Opera Prima – including by freshly minted MW Andrea Lonardi, Valpolicella Consorzio Vice President – commercially, the region has had a spectacular recent run. From 1997 to 2023, he said, Valpolicella’s planted hectarage nearly doubled while the quantity of grapes for Amarone production increased by 492%. However, Lonardi cautioned, this success has stemmed from Northern Europe and North America’s demand for ‘soft, warm, pleasurable’ wines, and demand for that specific style has waned considerably.

Some question whether Amarone – a wine strongly influenced by its production method, which Lonardi noted is easily imitable – is even the way forward. Amarone skeptics in the region are betting on Valpolicella Superiore, a new, flexible category allowing everything from exclusively fresh grapes to fully dried, and potentially with a more site-specific approach.

However, as Viens and I discussed, if site-specificity is indeed vital to collectability (as it has seemed since the rise of Burgundy), Amarone has a unique hand to play, its style linked not only to growing site but also the site of appassimento, assuming it’s not too technologically influenced. It is also worth recalling that Amarone developed in response to Valpolicella’s devaluation from the end of World War II – the region’s previous major planting boom – to the 1980s, which left ‘Valpo’ an international reputation as a light, anonymous red. Amarone, for all its current challenges, was born a fine wine, with limited quantity (another key for collectability) inscribed in its production code and, as Viens argued, a structure almost purpose-designed for longevity.

Much has been made of the fact that Valpolicella’s lightness – its once-maligned trait – has recently infiltrated Amarone. Indeed, lighter Amarone styles witnessed in the wines of Bertani – or Secondo Marco, Massimago, Rubinelli Vajol, Villa Spinosa, Brigaldara or Musella – abound. However, among producers aiming for collectable status, many seem wary of ‘light’ Amarone. Riccardo Tedeschi (Tedeschi) merely shook his head at the idea, though he agreed ‘drinkability’ was vital. Zýmē and Tommaso Bussola, two Quintarelli accolytes whose wines (La Mattonara and Vigneto Alto respectively) appeared in Viens’ masterclass, plus Quintarelli itself, are hardly making ‘light’ wines. This seems particularly true of ambitious site-specific, ‘cru’ wines: Tommasi’s De Buris, Tedeschi’s Capitel Monte Olmi, Maternigo and La Fabriseria, Masi’s Mazzano and Campolongo di Torbe and Quintarelli’s new site-focused project Tre Terre (‘three lands’) are generally brooding and dark.

The key to drinkability has thus been substantial cask and/or bottle ageing at the winery – Zýmē and Bussola’s are both released over a decade after vintage – a major investment to ensure wines are essentially ready on release. Beyond this, some producers hope to overcome their lack of a robust secondary market track record through the release of library wines, which help demonstrate longevity and (at least in theory) the fine-wine intentions present at the time they were made. Bertani, for instance, has an unparalleled stash dating back to the birth of Amarone; these are well worth seeking out.

However, they are not especially helpful for understanding most Amarone from the mid-2000s – the era most widely available on today’s secondary market – which are dramatically bigger and bolder in style. Among the wines of this era in Viens’ masterclass, the wine list of which was a ‘snapshot’ of Amarone traded on Liv-ex on a single day, the aforementioned Bussola (2007) and Zýmē (2008) had held up well but the 2006 Amarone from Roccolo Grassi was decidedly volatile. Viens’ contention that critics don’t give Amarone sufficiently long drinking windows – something I agree with in general – unfortunately doesn’t account for the fact that many wines not originally intended for the secondary market may have been spottily stored.

Thus, perhaps even more so than usual, provenance is key; Quintarelli and Dal Forno aside, I would think twice before buying from sources other than the wineries, licensed agents or very reputable merchants, who have their own reputations to defend. The clear ambition among wineries today – along with serious capital reserves, thanks partly to Valpolicella Ripasso, the commercial juggernaut of approximately the past 40 years and a subject for another day – suggests the wines being released now are the smart choice for would-be Amarone collectors, especially since the wineries have already done a fair share of the waiting for you. Release prices have been reasonable to date but as the release prices in other regions have skyrocketed, that seems unlikely to endure for long.