Wine from a 300-Year-Old Vine

Sebastjan Štemberger's story begins in a large, historically Turkish farm in the hilltop village of Šepulje, in the heart of the Karst plateau. [^4^] The building is designed in a square with a large central courtyard — an architectural defence against the fierce winds that whip across the plateau. The Štembergers came from Alto Adige long enough ago for their Germanic name to acquire its Slavic punctuation. [^4^] Sebastjan and his wife Loredana, along with their three sons, live and make wine in this historic property, which they maintain in exchange for producing their wines in its ancient cellar. In 2022, they completed a new separate cellar adjacent to the vineyards behind the farmhouse. [^4^]

Trellised as an arbor on the outside of the farmhouse are two 300-year-old Teran vines — the oldest grapevine on the Karst — which Sebastjan cares for and uses to produce clones for his vineyards. [^4^] This is not a romantic detail; it is the living root of his work, a genetic thread connecting his wines to the deep past of the region. The farm is also the familial home of two elderly sisters who still live there, and the Štembergers maintain the property with traditional materials — local rock and wood — restoring it by hand in the old style. [^4^]

Sebastjan studied winemaking during Slovenia's Socialist period, learning technical winemaking on an industrial scale. [^4^] It was not the style of winemaking he had in his heart. His father was a winemaker but passed away when Sebastjan was a child. Sebastjan wanted to make the wines of his childhood memories. Through trial and error, he searched out his own taste and style. For ten years, he sold his production to local restaurants to be served on tap as "open wine" — a period of self-education that gives his wines their very personal, unmistakable feel. [^4^] Slowly, as he gained experience and acquired vineyards, he began to bottle. Today, his wines are recognised as some of the most distinctive and soulful coming out of Slovenia.

Sebastjan Štemberger's winemaking is characterised by skin maceration and extended barrel ageing, resulting in wines of distinctive personality marked by strength, ripeness, and finesse. [^5^] The whites are often skin-macerated — what the world now calls orange wine — but Sebastjan's touch is unique. His wines are always aromatic, expressive of fruit at the precise moment they should be consumed. The length of skin maceration and control of extract seem to emulsify the wines, giving richness without weight, extract without tannin. [^4^] This is complemented by his intelligent management of yeast and lees contact, creating an elegance of texture that is rare in skin-contact wines.

The wines are aged in oak or acacia wooden vats — classic barrels and huge conical wooden vats — which mellow the texture and add dimension without overwhelming the fruit. [^5^] Sebastjan's approach has been described as a blend of Karst tradition and Jura inspiration, though the wines remain unmistakably Slovenian in character. [^5^] Once open, the wines react to air and temperature, each bottle displaying many faces — calm, gentle, suave, buoyant rather than aggressively tannic. [^4^]

His Zelen is a benchmark for the variety — an autochthonous grape from the Vipava Valley that was near extinction in the early 2000s and has seen a recent revival. [^1^] Sebastjan's version spends three months on skins and ages in acacia barrels, resulting in a medium-bodied orange wine with lighter tannic structure, aromas of stone fruits, crushed herbs, and steeped black tea, with racy acidity. [^1^] His Malvasia and Vitovska are equally distinctive — the Vitovska in particular is a rare variety native to the Karst, grown on less than 70 hectares in Slovenia and Italy, and celebrated annually at the Mare e Vitovska festival at Duino Castle. [^7^]

The Terranatura — made from Refosco, the trademark grape of the Karst — is a red of remarkable freshness and ferrous character, prized historically for its medicinal value due to its high antioxidant content. [^7^] The Pet-nat, a blend of Vitovska and Malvasia, is playful and lively with natural sediments, reflecting the growing region in its blend. [^7^] And then there is Oxy — a wine for special occasions made from late-harvest grapes with noble rot, given lengthy maceration with abundant aeration and bâtonnage, then left to mature on the lees for up to fifteen years. [^7^] This is not a winery that rushes; time is the final ingredient in every bottle.