Antonio Perrino is from Dolceacqua, a quiet, pretty little town in the Ligurian foothills, just a few miles from the seaside holiday towns of the Mediterranean.
Nino has just a few hectares of vines and ancient olive groves which he farms organically on steep terraces planted over clay and limestone high up in the hills. The oldest vines are over a hundred years of age, the oldest trees over a thousand. It is a truly magical place, heady with herbs and with views all the way to Corsica on a clear day.
The wines are made in his garage in the town centre, the smallest winemaking setup we have seen. His tools consist of a couple of old barrels and a vertical press. Production is carried out in the same fashion it was when Nino began making wines here with his father some fifty years ago and the wines, fittingly, taste as if they were from another age.