Look at the place! The simplicity of the farmhouse, the hillslope of orderly vineyards facing the early afternoon sun. Lose oneself in the enjoyment of the ancient, small things in life, observe the old Barbera and Moscato rootstocks, move around the small rooms and up the narrow stairs imbued in history. And then sit down at an outdoor table, a terrace looking out on a forgotten world, while the women of Cascina Castle't with a desecrating sense of modernity, with a rapid gesture of efficiency, their culture expressed through a smile. Twenty hectares of land framed in a dream. Tasting, to the utmost, the perfection of a glass of wine.

What matters is not the 20 hectares, eighteen of which planted with vineyards, nor the plan for future enlargement, but the care taken of each single plant, the study of the most ancient techniques carried out by means of the most modern and sophisticated analyses. One should walk along the vine-rows, in autumn, when the grapes are ripe and swollen by the sun and, in winter, when the black rootstocks contrast with the virgin snow. Barbera, with its rough skin, and Moscato, delicate and with a perfume as alluring as a siren's song. And, recently, Uvalino, strong, sure of itself as only those who boast a long history that has just come to light can be. The grass among the vine-rows, the birds enticed by the small wooden shelters, the calcareous-clayey soil, seven or eight buds per plant in a classic Guyot layout, and the hills of Costigliole all around. The vines, trained in varying ways, whose patterns are landscape art designed by history.

The farmhouse's ancient stone walls protect the wines, which, young and capable of becoming elegant, are left to refine, in silence and in the half-shadows, in large, dark, traditional 34-hectolitre oak casks and in modern, light-wood barriques (225-litre kegs). Elsewhere, on the other side of the yard, is to be found quite a different cellar, representing the wine's other soul. Modern and sophisticated machinery, automatic bottling lines, steel and maniacal cleanlinesss. Checks during every working stage, and light-emitting diodes that keep going on and off, almost as if to remind us as to how electronics has now been placed at man's service. Upstairs, in a sort of unadorned loft, a long line of drying trays for the best grapes, destined to become that rare wine which was once offered as a gift to the priest, the doctor, or even for ourselves on festive occasions.