E. Pira e Figli - Chiara Boschis

The Robert Parker Green Emblem is designed to recognize producers who act as ambassadors for sustainability. Outside the protocols practiced on their own properties, they inspire their neighbors to make the changes needed to better protect our environment. A single vision becomes a shared vision. The Barolo region of Piedmont in Northern Italy is home to one of these ambassadors. She is Chiara Boschis of E. Pira e Figli - Chiara Boschis, a lone female voice in a land of slow-moving traditions. Her mission is to convert all 28 growers that farm in the 46-hectare Cannubi MGA (perhaps the most prestigious site in the appellation) to organics. The project is called “Cannubi Biologico,” or “Cannubi Bio.” So far, she is joined by 25 of the 28. Her quest is to make Cannubi a fully organic vineyard. “It felt like mission impossible at the beginning, but we are getting close to our goal,” says Chiara Boschis from her winery in Barolo. “Sometimes a single drop of water can break apart a giant rock.” Of the three who have not joined Cannubi Bio, only one is a winery that bottles Barolo Cannubi with estate grapes. The other two are growers that sell their fruit. Chiara fears that it will be difficult to convince these last two because their businesses are more averse to risk. However, she is optimistic that she can soon bring all three over to the green side. Cannubi Bio was not started by a growers’ association, a foundation or a certification entity. Instead, it is a grassroots movement driven by the sheer willpower of one very tenacious woman. In 2010, Chiara Boschis was the first to become certified for organics in the village of Barolo. When she sought to certify her tiny 6,000-square meter plot in Cannubi, she faced multiple challenges because some of her immediate neighbors in this tight patchwork of vines farmed conventionally with chemicals. Sprays used at an adjoining property could easily blow over to hers. “I was told that I needed to do one of two things,” she explains. “I either had to create a buffer zone to guarantee that zero chemical residue would appear in my lab tests, or I had to convince my neighbors to join me in organics.” Given how small her parcel is, the buffer zone solution was impossible. In 2014, she was knocking on her neighbors’ doors, one by one, asking them to join Cannubi Bio. “There was a lot of optimism surrounding my initiative at a time when we needed good news,” she says. Only the year before, Italy’s high court made a controversial ruling that many producers viewed as an unnatural enlargement of Cannubi’s historic boundaries and consequently a loss of prestige for the historic site. Today, Cannubi is farmed by some of Barolo’s most illustrious names, including Bartolo Mascarello, Comm. G.B. Burlotto, Damilano, Elio Altare, Francesco Rinaldi & Figli, Michele Chiarlo, Paolo Scavino (only until the 2018 vintage) and Poderi Luigi Einaudi among others. Thanks to the Cannubi Bio initiative, computerized monitoring devices have been placed throughout the vineyard to measure temperature, humidity, sunlight hours and more. “We all have access to an online database that gives us mathematical models necessary to optimize organic farming,” says Chiara. Cannubi Bio could eventually become a logo for sustainability and organics, she concedes. However, Chiara is less interested in the marketing or promotional aspect of her initiative. “Actions speak louder than words,” she says. “To me, the most important thing is getting it done.”

E. Pira e Figli is the official name of the estate owned by Chiara Bochis in the village of Barolo. However, the brand name is recorded as “E. Pira e Figli - Chiara Boschis” in our database because both names appear on the front labels of the wines. When she started her winemaking career, she became known as the only “Barolo Girl” in a tight-knit group of traditional winemakers that had taken the simpatico moniker “Barolo Boys.” “I felt so invested when I started,” she says. “It’s like we were called upon to do something grand.” The historic Pira family, which traces its winemaking roots back to the 1700s, founded the estate. Patriarch Gigi Pira died in 1980, leaving the estate to his two sisters. Unable to manage the business, the sisters asked their close friends, the Boschis family, to lend a hand. Chiara’s brothers Cesare and Giorgio would inherit the family business, Borgogno, following local custom in which property is passed down along male lines. (Borgogno would later be sold to the Farinetti family.) The Pira sisters decided to sell their winery in 1981. Chiara Boschis convinced her father to loan her the money to make the acquisition so that she could have a project of her own. She was in school at the time but came onboard by the late 1980s. Her brother Giorgio would eventually join her in 2010. Chiara Boschis never wanted to remove the Pira name from her label. In fact, she initially added her own name in parentheses. Today, it is written in italics in a red font. E. Pira e Figli - Chiara Boschis makes three outstanding expressions of Barolo. There is the Barolo Cannubi (in Barolo), the Barolo Mosconi (from newly acquired vineyards in Monforte d’Alba) and the Barolo Via Nuova, which is a blend of fruit from Terlo and Liste (in Barolo), Ravera di Monforte and Mosconi (in Monforte d’Alba) and Gabutti and Baudana (in Serralunga d’Alba).