Marco Ludovico
Marco Ludovico is a third-generation winegrower from Mottola, in Puglia’s Terra delle Gravine. His four hectares of vineyards lie on the plateau above the Gulf of Taranto, a landscape of limestone, deep ravines and persistent winds. Wine and farming have been part of life here for generations, and grapes like Primitivo, Verdeca and Minutolo belong as naturally to the landscape as the old farmhouses and olive groves that surround them.
Marco grew up working alongside his family in the vineyards and cellar, but he wanted to understand wine beyond the world he knew. He left Puglia to study viticulture and oenology at the University of Udine, then worked in Italy, Argentina and New Zealand. When he eventually returned to Mottola, he came home seeing the familiar with fresh eyes, newly curious about what the grapes and landscape he had known all his life could express.
In 2017 he started his own project, Marco Ludovico – Enoartigiano in Terra delle Gravine. Marco describes his approach as artisanal, personal and territorial. He respects the traditions he inherited, but does not feel bound by them—or by the rules of conventional, biodynamic or natural wine. He draws on everything he has learned, watches each vintage closely and gives himself the freedom to decide what each grape and vineyard needs.
That freedom is visible in the wines. Minutolo becomes Matìn, a fresh, sparkling wine; Verdeca takes center stage as a saline, mineral white; and Primitivo shows two completely different sides of itself in the vibrant rosato Petruscio and a structured yet remarkably fresh red. These are grapes with long histories in this corner of Puglia, but Marco approaches them with the curiosity of someone still asking what they can become.
Everything is done on a tiny, hands-on scale. The vineyards are farmed organically, with all vineyard work done by hand, and grapes are picked into small crates during the cool early hours of the morning. Marco prepares a pied de cuve from indigenous yeasts to begin fermentation, and extended aging on the fine lees is an important thread through his cellar work, building texture and complexity while preserving freshness. The wines are bottled without fining or filtration, sulfur is used sparingly when needed, and every bottle is labeled and numbered by hand.
At the heart of Marco’s work is his belief in a symbiosis between people and nature. For him, terroir is not simply the soil beneath the vines or the climate around them. The person making the wine is part of the story too. The vineyard gives Marco the character of Mottola; his experience, judgment and personality shape how he brings it into the glass. He is not trying to recreate the past or leave it behind. He is taking what he inherited and making it his own.
The wines carry that same balance. They are layered and complex, with texture, savory character and a clear sense of place, yet remain bright, energetic and deeply pleasurable to drink. Their story gives you a reason to care; what is in the glass gives you a reason to come back.
