first corporate museum to join the public network of Siena museums.
In Valdichiana , the Tuscan capital of Culture 2025, a stone’s throw from Montepulciano , a pearl of the Renaissance, in an extraordinary landscape, a natural oasis among vineyards as far as the eye can see, oak woods and olive groves, on May 17 , with the cutting of an unusual and symbolic ribbon made from a vine shoot, LE MACCHINE DEL VINO , the Carpineto company museum, was inaugurated. A small cross-section of almost two centuries of oenology brought together by a winemaker who has dedicated and dedicates his entire life to making wine and has lived the most dynamic sixty years in the history of wine in Tuscany.
THE WINE MACHINES , the collection of CARPINETO Grandi Vini di Toscana, a company registered in the National Register of Historic Brands, was conceived and brought together by the co-founder of the Tuscan company among the most famous names in Italian wine, Antonio Mario Zaccheo, who has gathered here testimonies preserved, sought and collected over the years, emblems of an entire life dedicated to agriculture and wine in particular. From the museum to the vineyard and vice versa, wine tells its story.
“ LE MACCHINE DEL VINO is a one-of-a-kind private collection that tells the story and evolution of machines for producing and preserving wine and, through these, the reality of two families who have dedicated themselves with passion to this land.
We are happy that it is the first corporate museum to join the Fondazione Musei Senesi network and we gladly welcome it precisely for its ability to tell a story that starts from the territory, from the community that lives there and from typical production activities. This entry confirms once again how FMS is a network open to welcoming those significant entities that want to tell and enhance the material and immaterial heritage of the lands of Siena and its communities” – underlines Alessandro Ricceri , president of Fondazione Musei Senesi.
“I am honored that my collection has become part of the Foundation and very happy to give a small contribution to a region that among its most precious assets includes a very prestigious wine production” – says Antonio Mario Zaccheo who also wants to underline the non-exhaustive and evolving nature of this collection that will continue to be enriched with new pieces.
“LE MACCHINE DEL VINO is located in the original place of the collection and production and represents not only a document of the history and tradition of a precious artisan work such as that of the winemaker, but it is also an expression of its continuity between past and present and of the changes, and above all of our deep bond with the territory”, continues Zaccheo who wanted to ideally represent here the beginning and end of the production process , from the vineyard to the bottle.
The collection in fact includes machines, tools, objects, documents, photographs, texts that offer a cross-section of the evolution of winemaking machines from the very first cellars through the ferment of the 60s of the last century to the turning point of the 80s: it begins with the work in the vineyard, then in the cellar and arrives at the habits and customs at the table through trade and exchanges.
All seen through the eyes, the passion, the knowledge of a man who began as a child (next to his grandfather and then to his father already winemakers) to make wine, continued with his friend and partner Giovanni Carlo Sacchet with whom in 1967 he founded the Tuscan company that then became over the years one of the excellences of Italian wine, and still continues to do so. A man whose life summarizes over 60 years of wine history, from the pioneering beginnings to the prestige of today.
The collection has a total of over 180 objects including wine-making machines and work objects . In addition, there is a small personal library with volumes, magazines, guides and period photographs.
Coming into more detail to some mini exhibition sections: there is the viticulture section with even horseshoes and a hoe and the many types of pruning shears almost to cut out the profile of a “wine tailoring shop”.
The wine section with the pumps, the first collected here are from the end of the 19th century, they are balance pumps operated by two people, passing through those that are part of the mechanical evolution that begins at the beginning of the 20th century. In the same area, filters, presses, presses, scales.
And again, sparkling wine making machines, a very first bottling machine, a labelling machine.
The reconstruction of an oenologist’s laboratory is intriguing, with over 30 objects including scales, ampoules, microscopes, a refrigerating column, tasting glass, etc. collected from various wine analysis laboratories and dating back to the end of the nineteenth century. Some of these, especially the glassware, are still in use: pipettes, flasks, burettes, graduated cylinders.
Manual immersion thermometers for monitoring fermentation temperatures, an early example of an electronic thermometer.
Among the curiosities are a Malligand , an instrument that measured the percentage of alcohol, an acidometer for determining the acidity, volatile, and then pipettes, and graduated cylinders that were used to compose the cuts between the various wines and test them on a small scale before making them. And again, small precision scales, capable of measuring up to the thousandth. A microscope from the end of the 19th century completes the whole.
Among the oldest objects dating back to the late 18th century, two wooden filters and cotton bags that were used to pass the wine through.
The section of caps, cappers and corkscrews displayed by type and evolution is rich.
A collection that represents a new small piece added to the story of wine, a good that has been the heritage of humanity for centuries, and that “belongs to culture, paradoxically we could say more to culture than to nature” to use the words of Tullio Gregory.
The exhibition space is diffusely illuminated both with natural light thanks to the huge windows that open onto the countryside, and with wall lighting; adjacent to the space is a large hall with a wine bar for welcoming visitors and conviviality.
Upstairs, in a charming open-space mezzanine overlooking the barrel cellars, is the technical tasting room with over 30 seats.
Outside, plots of land as far as the eye can see where you can live an immersive experience in a contemporary agricultural reality where precision agriculture is practiced with latest-generation machines and technologies with very low environmental impact.
The collection is in fact located on the Vino Nobile di Montepulciano estate, which lies partly in the municipality of Chianciano Terme and partly in the municipality of Montepulciano, a green oasis powered largely by solar energy in the most beautiful Tuscany . A wine retreat of 180 hectares of land dedicated to vineyards, olive groves and woods, an ideal environment for the game that populates it in its natural state. A cross-section of the most evocative Tuscan landscape, vineyards and more, where close to the vineyards there are also two Etruscan tombs identified by the Superintendence of Archaeological Heritage and not yet excavated.
At the estate, WINE TOURISM is practiced with a wide range of proposals for trekking, tastings, picnics on the grass, open-air lunches, and with specialized staff able to carry out tastings and walks among the rows but also guided tours of the museum . Visits that can be connected to wine experiences or completely autonomous.
