Paolo Bea

Bea’s wines remain singular—boisterous, unabashedly wild expressions of their undulating, sun-drenched hills of origin, each new vintage of which is eagerly anticipated by a legion of loyal clients.
References in the archives of Montefalco, the beautiful hill town in Umbria, document the presence of the Bea family in this locality as early as 1500. Azienda Agricola Paolo Bea is a classic Italian fattoria, producing wine, raising farm animals for trade and home consumption, and working the land to produce olives, fruits, and vegetables. At the time Neal began working with the family in the late 1980s, a young and ambitious Giampiero Bea was learning the ropes alongside his father Paolo—a through-and-through farmer with an Umbrian dialect so thick as to be nearly incomprehensible to outsiders. Paolo produced shockingly expressive wines using a bare minimum of technology, and while these staunchly old-school wines were out of step with the modernization-happy Italian trends of the 1980s and 1990s, they resonated deeply with Neal and with our clients—and they continue to do so decades later. Giampiero has long been at the helm of Azienda Agricola Paolo Bea, and his commitment to healthy farming and low-intervention cellar work has made him a pillar in the Italian natural wine community. But it is Paolo’s approach—so bred-in-bone as to seem instinctual—that guides the estate to this day, given voice and definition through Giampiero’s remarkable work. --RWM