Few wine estates in Italy occupy as striking a position as Nusserhof: a tiny certified organic vineyard sitting inside the city limits of Bolzano, the capital of South Tyrol. Heinrich Mayr and his daughter Gloria work a parcel of land that the family has farmed since at least 1788, making some of the most individual wines in northern Italy from grapes that almost disappeared entirely.
Backstory
The Mayr family has cultivated the Nusserhof site continuously since documentary records begin in 1788. As the city of Bolzano expanded dramatically after World War II, the vineyards became surrounded by urban development, yet the family held on to their land and their methods. Heinrich Mayr converted the estate to certified organic farming in 1994, decades before it became fashionable. His daughter Gloria joined the operation in 2018 and has gradually assumed responsibility for the winemaking, preserving the house style while bringing her own perspective.
The Region
Alto Adige, known in German as Sudtirol, is Italy's northernmost wine region, set in a deep valley carved by the Adige and Isarco rivers beneath the Dolomite mountains. Bolzano sits at the confluence of these rivers, at only 265 meters elevation, giving it one of the warmest summer climates in the region. The rocky soils around the city are rich in alluvial sediment, porphyry, sand, and gravel deposited over millennia by the Isarco River.
Vineyards and Farming
The main vineyard surrounds the family home and covers 2.4 hectares. A second small and steep parcel located 3 kilometers away is planted to old, pergola-trained Schiava vines. All vines are trained using the Guyot system on the main property and the traditional Casarsa on the secondary parcel. Certified organic since 1994, the estate grows exclusively indigenous Alto Adige varieties: Lagrein, Teroldego, Schiava, and Blatterle. The Blatterle is a white grape so rare it was nearly lost to viticulture; Heinrich Mayr propagated the last surviving vines to bring it back to production.
Winemaking
All fermentation is natural, with no temperature control and no inoculated yeasts. Red wines undergo long macerations and are aged for a minimum of two and a half years in large French oak botti, followed by at least two additional years in bottle before release. The Blatterle white is aged in stainless steel tank. The result is wines of exceptional structure and mineral precision, moderate in alcohol, and built for decades of cellaring.
The Wines
The core of the range is Lagrein, a smoky, tannic, deep-fruited red native to Bolzano. The Lagrein Riserva is the estate's most ambitious bottling. Teroldego, another indigenous red, appears alongside two wines named after family members: 'Elda', a Schiava rosato named for Heinrich's wife, and 'Gloria', a white from Blatterle named for his daughter. Annual production is small, reflecting the 2.4-hectare scale of the property.
