Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio: Celebrating 60 years as an Italian icon

Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio is celebrating 60 years as an Italian icon. It’s a wine loved by American celebrities and is sold in 95 countries around the world. But among wine circles, Pinot Grigio is a sometimes-snubbed style of wine, dismissed as being characterless and bland. Sophia Longhi explores why Santa Margherita is different from the rest and why you perhaps should give it a try.

When I was about seven years old, I saw a picture of a woman in a shop window. She had short fluffy blonde hair and a beauty spot just above her painted-red lips. ‘Madonna!’ I said to my dad. ‘That’s not Madonna,’ he told me. ‘That’s Marilyn Monroe.’

Marilyn Monroe? I’d never even heard of her. Who was this lady who looked like Madonna? What I later found out was that it was Madonna who looked like Marilyn, not the other way around, and that Marilyn Monroe was one of the greatest film stars that ever lived. She was the original G. Everything else – 1983 Madonna, Jayne Mansfield – was just a watery imitation.

Which brings me to Pinot Grigio. Pale, neutral, characterless? That’s the impression that many of us have of Pinot Grigio. Yet, unbeknown to us, we perhaps have been courting the watery imitations all along.

Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio is the original G. It was the first producer to create a white wine from the Pinot Grigio pink grape. Before they did this, Pinot Grigio was a rust-coloured skin-contact wine, which was often blended with Schiava. In 1960 (the same year Let’s Make Love starring Marilyn Monroe was released), Santa Margherita fermented Pinot Grigio off the skins and in 1961, the world discovered white Pinot Grigio.

Unlike Let’s Make Love, white Pinot Grigio was a monster hit. In 1979, Santa Margherita white Pinot Grigio entered the United States in huge quantities and its success paved the way for a plethora of white Pinot Grigio copycats to swipe on in and get a piece of the action.

So, what makes Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio different? 

First of all, terroir. Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio is a wine of terroir rather than of method. The grapes are grown in the Valle dell’Adige appellation in northern Italy (also known as the Etschtal), a mountainous, alpine region in Trentino-Alto Adige. At the top of the river valley, you have the Alps to the west and the Dolomites to the east, and at the bottom, you have the Pre-Alps. The imitation Pinot Grigios come from the flatlands (Santa Margherita brand rep, Alberto, tells me: “Flat land, flat flavour”.) 

Pinot Grigio from the mountains has higher levels of aromatics, due to the wide diurnal temperature range (it is very hot during the day and very cold during the night). All of the aromas are contained in the first layer of grape skin, next to the pulp, and as the cells expand and contract with the heat and the cold, they eventually break, releasing the aromas into the pulp. 

You don’t get these aromatics in Pinot Grigio from the flatlands. Here, there is the fresh scent of ripe golden apples, white blossom and zesty lime.

On the palate, Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio possesses a pronounced salinity (the Alps were once under the ocean – could this be why?) and a minerality from the stones, pebbles and clay brought down from the river. The soils here are moraine in origin, which occur from glaciated regions. The flatlands have a different history and there is a marked difference in complexity and quality, with the salty finish of Santa Margherita lingering on the tongue, instead of a fast-disappearing wisp of flavour. 

Instead of neutral and characterless, this Pinot Grigio is complex in its lightness, making it extremely versatile with different foods. It pairs well with a variety of dishes (sweet and spicy Asian dishes, tacos, salmon – to name a few), but Alberto, encourages me to “drink for mood, not food”, because “it is always the right time to pop open a bottle of Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio”.

In the post-war sixties, just as Marilyn Monroe reached the peak of her stardom, Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio became an icon at the Italian dinner table, a symbol of joy. Today it is on the dinner table in 95 countries around the world. Globally, Santa Margherita has built a solid reputation as a lifestyle wine, something that rappers include in their lyrics (“Santa Margherita by the litre,” spits Drake) and have on ice at backstage parties (Katy Perry requests two bottles of Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio in her rider). 

Yes, excellent marketing is part of their success. But so is terroir, quality and legacy.  

Alberto muses: “Every day we are a different person. Every wine will be a little different – it is a new experience every time.” 

Are you willing to have a new experience of Pinot Grigio? It might be time for you to become acquainted with the original G.

Find out more about Santa Margherita on their website here.