Movia and the quest to make what’s old new again

In the tranquil hills of Slovenia’s Goriška Brda of the Primorska wine region, a quiet revolution has taken root.

Together with its neighbor, the Collio Goriziano of Friuli-Venezia Giulia in Italy, Brda is credited with sparking interest in orange wines and establishing the style as more than fad.

Orange wines started emerging from this joint Adriatic alcove and gaining notice in the late 1990s and 2000s. On the part of Brda, becoming part of the driving force behind the orange wines movement has meant a restoration and finessing of a lost tradition.

Orange wines are white wines made based on the adaptation of ancient methods and named for their color. The catchy, if misleading, “orange” handle caught on in the early 2000s, and producers and writers alike seem to have been laboring under the misperceptions caused by it ever since.  

Orange refers to the deepened shades of gold, amber, and burnt orange that are imparted by the color pigments of the grape skins, which are allowed to remain in contact with the juice as it ferments in large, often cement or ceramic vessels.

How long the wine is left to steep and concentrate in this style of winemaking varies from hours to days to months.

Though a richer, more concentrated color may be the result of this process, the goal is to draw out additional flavors and aromas. The philosophy behind it is to do it with as little human intervention as possible.

The process is modeled after and inspired by the subterranean qveri (“kev-ree”) found in the Caucasus, more specifically the area that is today the country of Georgia, as the original winemaking technique.

Closed with a mixture of stones and clay and sealed with beeswax, qveri date back to 6,000 BCE. They would be buried underground as a means of temperature control, keeping things regulated in the coolness of the earth as fermentation started to generate heat.

Today, cooling jackets and other techniques are used to prevent the fermenting wine from rising above the temperature where flavor compounds would boil off and evaporate.

Other insights of ancient vitners included the acorn shape of the qveri. The pointed bottom created a settling point for sediments to fall and gather, naturally separating themselves from the liquid of the wine.

Here in the 21st century, winemakers are turning to and revitalizing these practices as a minimalist, hands-off approach.

The resurrection of orange wines and the start of the trend is often credited to Joško Gravner, a producer in the Collio, who first attempted orange wine in 1997. There is more than one account of Gravner driving a lorry from Georgia to collect qveri that paints as picturesque an origin story as any.   

Alongside Gravner, other producers recognized for making a name with orange wines include Stanko Radikon, also of the Collio and succeeded by his son Saša, and Aleš Kristančič of Movia in Brda.

Their idea to soak the grape skins in the fermenting juice, a stage technically referred to as maceration, is nothing new in the realm of traditional red wines.

It does, however, bring a twist to the tactics for white wines, where the name of the game is often freshness and crispness.

Classically speaking, white wines are made by immediately pressing the harvested grapes to separate the juice from the skins before fermentation.

Fermentation is typically done in sealed vats to prevent oxidation that could cause a browning color or flatten the zip of the wine.  

When it comes to white wines, one reason for dividing the grape skins from the fermenting juice is to prevent the skins from imparting tannin, a compound also found in the seeds and stems. Tannin can have a bitter or astringent taste, or leave a fuzzy or filmy feeling, traits seen as conflicting with the lighter notes of classic white wines.

Overall, it’s highly acidic varietals that show well as orange wine. Their elevated acidity is able to help counterbalance the tannin, as well as the enhanced body and texture that comes with the winemaking style, with a crispness to keep the wine in overall harmony.

Varietals often used for orange wine from this region include sauvignon vert (friulano), ribolla gialla, and pinot grigio. The Italian term Ramato, meaning “auburn,” is another name for orange wines and is typically reserved for when it’s pinot grigio made in this style.  

The taste of orange wine can take on sour notes or a nuttiness from the greater exposure to oxygen than if the wine were made in steel tanks.

In Slovenia, maceration for both red and white wines was common in the early- and mid-20th century.

Prior to the 1960s and 70s and the introduction of the cylindrical pneumatic press, which stands horizontally and has a rubber membrane that runs through the center to slowly inflate, pushing the grapes against the perforated steel lining so that the juice runs over the sides and collects in a bottom tray, producers relied on the strength of manual labor in working a mechanical press.

To make it easier to extract the juice, producers used to let the grapes soften first by allowing them to start fermenting.

This process also infused the wine with tannins, which act as a natural preservative, to help prevent spoilage.

As a restoration of this maceration technique, orange wines represent more of a reconnection and modernization of the past than a true novelty.

It seems fitting that Brda and the Collio, often viewed as oenologically united, should be recognized together as forebearers in creating orange wine’s present and future.

A Tale of Two Hillsides

The pair’s topographies and climates are, by and large, considered such an extension of each other as to supersede borders.

Both enjoy a combination of Adriatic and Alpine influences that keep days warm, nights cool, and the air free of humidity that could cause rot.

Their soils bare traces of flysch, a combination of shale and sandstone that easily crumbles under the touch and as it breaks down turns into a softer clay.

The closeness of Brda and Collio is even reflected in their names. Brda, in Slovenian, means Collio, which translates as hill, in Italian.

A general tendency to merge Brda and the Collio as one is rare in an industry that can take the sense of terroir, that certain je ne sais quois of a wine’s character, down to the individual land plot.

Indeed, more distinction is often given between the Collio and its neighbor and fellow standard bearer within Friuli, the Colli Orientali, than differentiation between Collio and Brda.

Despite their many shared natural attributes, the two experienced separate fates as modern winemaking dawned in the 1960s and 70s, a period marked by such upticks as increased consumption of wines in countries like the United States.

The era was a boon for the Collio. Its larger subzone of Friuli was gaining international reclaim, in particular for the region’s white wines that expressed delicacy and backbone.

For Friuli to be firmly stamped on the world wine map at this time took the foresight of producers who worked vineyards in the 1950s that had been left uncultivated during World War II while most of the region was industrializing and urbanizing.

Meanwhile, over the hill in Brda, producers were limited by political forces. Government restrictions required that half of harvests be delivered to a state cooperative. Quantity over quality was the mandate

In 1958, the Kristančič family of Movia wines successfully lobbied Josip Broz Tito for an exemption to the cooperatives established by the dictator. Instead, Movia became the supplier of the official state wine.

Today, Movia’s wines are distinctly international, with only one-fifth of production sold within the domestic market.

Leadership of Movia as a world brand and central character in the orange wine narrative is in the hands of Aleš Kristančič as the eighth generation of winemakers.

The Movia estate has been in the Kristančič family since 1820, and grape cultivation goes back as far. Like many of the producers in the area, Movia maintains vineyards in both Brda and Collio, with the 22 hectares split evenly between the two.

The timing for Aleš to take the helm of Movia and for the orange wine renaissance to bud in the region seemed made for each other.

Slovenia’s rise as part of the orange wine revolution in the late 1990s and early 2000s is unlikely without the country becoming the first to declare independence from the former Yugoslavia, in 1991, and the lifting of previous political restrictions.

For his part, Aleš has taken full advantage of the clean slate and ability to make wines according to his vision.

Aleš trained in Bordeaux and Burgundy before turning his attention to Movia. In addition to adhering to orange wine practices, Aleš has also incorporated biodynamic principles.

The biodynamic concept started in the 1920s in Austria with philosopher Rudolph Steiner. It predates organic farming by roughly 20 years as the oldest anti-chemical agricultural movement.

The two main pillars of biodynamics are treating the vineyard as its own ecosystem and regulating all vineyard and cellar tasks by the lunar calendar.

Movia’s signature Lunar wine starts with a late harvest that is both picked and then destemmed by hand. The whole berries are then placed in new oak barrels with custom caps where fermentation begins within the berries themselves.

This style is known as carbonic maceration and yields a juicy style of wine. Traditionally it is used in Burgundy’s Beaujolais region as a way of enhancing and preserving the wine’s characteristic soft and fruity profile. 

After eight months of maturing, at the calendar’s full moon, Lunar is gravity racked into bottles without added sulphur, filtration, or pressing. It is then bottle aged for another six months.

As the description proudly states, “This is as close as it gets to the wine ancient man found in nature.”