The Folonari family has been making wine since the late eighteenth century. In 1825 the family-owned business took the name “Fratelli Folonari” and adopted the mission of developing, producing and distributing the finest Italian wines throughout the world.
In 1912, Italo Folonari – Ambrogio Folonari’s grandfather – and his brother Francesco purchased the Ruffino company in Tuscany that was famous for its Chianti wine in straw-covered flasks.
After World War II, major changes in terms of economic development and improving standards of living began taking place in Italy. This also affected the wine industry where the Folonari family and Ambrogio in particular were among the first to promote this trend by producing new, high quality wines that contributed to creating the “new frontier” of the Italian wine. At the end of the 1960s the family sold the “Fratelli Folonari” company that concentrated on table wines and began devoting themselves to estate-bottled wines. This was made possible through their acquisition of the famous Nozzole estate near Greve in Chianti in the heart of the Chianti Classico district. At the same time, with the aim of producing very fine wines, they purchased other wine-growing estates in Tuscany such as Cabreothat Ambrogio developed in the 1980s.
In 2000, Ambrogio left Ruffino and the rest of the family, and established with his son “Ambrogio e Giovanni Folonari Tenute”, holding on to some of the best properties. This led to the birth of a group of estates located in Tuscany’s finest wine-growing areas.