Cities
Grinzane Cavour (CN)
The Grinzane Castle has housed, since 1982, the seat of the Grinzane Cavour Prize, a recognition created with the aim of introducing young people to literature and contemporary narrative and which has assumed, over the years, the aspects of a real cultural foundation by promoting prizes, contest, conventions, and major events in Italy and abroad. In 1994, Grinzane began the Cultural Park project, an action to recuperate and safeguard the architectural, landscape, and anthropological aspects of the “literary places”, described by great writers from Piedmont, in the area that extends over the provinces of Cuneo, Asti, and Alessandria along the hills of the Langhe, Monferrato, and Roero. The castle’s most illustrious resident remains, in any case, Count Camillo Benso, father of the homeland and mayor of Grinzane from 1832 to 1849; many of his personal effects are still kept in the fortress, which is set up today as an ethnographic museum. Carrying the statesman’s name, is the Piedmont Regional Wine Cellar - the first in Piedmont in 1967 - which found room in the cantinas of the manor; here, imposing ancient presses – quite a sight in themselves - are on display to testify to the various techniques used in the practice of grape crushing. The rooms on the ground floor are now an exhibition salon for prized wines carefully selected by the masters of the Ordine dei Cavalieri del Tartufo e dei Vini di Alba (the Order of Knights of the Truffle and of Alba Wines), a wine and gastronomic fraternity created with the objective of spreading the quality of Langhe products.
Info
Piazza della Chiesa, 9 - 12060 Grinzane Cavour (Cn)
Tel.: +39.0173 262016
www.grinzane-cavour.it
