After more than 40 years helping build Allegrini and championing Amarone around the world, Marilisa Allegrini is starting a new chapter.

In this episode of Uncorking What’s Next, Marilisa sits down with Jeff Zacharia to discuss family, legacy, reinvention and the future of Italian wine.

Marilisa never originally intended to enter the wine business. She trained as a physical therapist before returning to work alongside her father. Two years later, he died unexpectedly, leaving her to find her place in the family company. She ultimately took Allegrini and the story of Valpolicella around the world, becoming so closely associated with Amarone that she became known as “Lady Amarone.”

Today, however, Marilisa believes Amarone itself must evolve. She discusses, lower alcohol, less residual sugar, larger oak and a move away from the heavily concentrated style that defined Amarone in previous decades.

She also addresses the difficult family transition that followed her brother’s death and her decision to begin again with a new group encompassing Villa Della Torre in Valpolicella, Poggio al Tesoro in Bolgheri and San Polo in Montalcino. Central to that new chapter are her daughters, Carlotta and Caterina, whom Marilisa wants to develop their own identities rather than simply become copies of her.

The conversation also examines women in Italian wine, declining wine consumption, changing consumer tastes and an industry that Marilisa believes has made wine unnecessarily difficult to understand.

Her prescription for reaching the next generation is simple: talk less about maceration, polyphenols and tannins—and tell better stories.

And perhaps the most important story is Marilisa’s own: after four decades building a family legacy, she is proving that experience doesn’t have to make you cautious. It can give you the confidence to start again.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Cold open and welcome to Uncorking What's Next

02:16 Why Marilisa Allegrini told her father not to count on her

03:05 Returning to the family winery and losing her father

05:03 Her father's focus on Valpolicella quality

06:48 Selling Italian wine in New York, Boston and Chicago

10:05 Grape varieties and the appassimento process

12:23 What credibility means in wine

13:16 Does Amarone need to change?

16:58 Larger oak barrels and a fresher style

18:56 Leaving the family company and starting again

21:39 Working with her daughters, Carlotta and Caterina

24:53 Why she chose Bolgheri

26:37 Montalcino, San Polo and Villa della Torre

29:56 Women in the wine business

31:56 What wine has to change for a new generation

34:49 Starting over in Italy and in America

37:22 The three closing questions

Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and everywhere you get podcasts: https://uncorking-whats-next.captivate.fm

Instagram: ⁠@uncorkingwhatsnext

Email: ⁠jzfinewine@gmail.com ⁠

Newsletter ⁠https://uncorkingwhatsnext.beehiiv.com/

Marilisa Allegrini: https://www.marilisa-allegrini.com

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