North of Montalcino, the ground changes. Montosoli is a small hill of calcareous galestro and marl, its north-facing slope giving it a distinctly cooler microclimate than the rest of the appellation, and it's long been considered the most distinct terroir in the region: it was here, in the late 1970s, that Altesino, Caparzo and Valdicava produced Montalcino's first single-vineyard Brunellos, staking an early claim that this ground spoke with its own voice. Several respected producers hold a parcel here. Baricci is the only one whose entire estate sits inside it. Nello Baricci bought his 5 hectares on the hill in 1955, the whole of what the family has ever farmed, and in 1967 became one of twenty-six founding members of the Consorzio del Vino Brunello di Montalcino, registering the first hectare of Brunello at the Chamber of Commerce in Siena. He made the estate's first Rosso in 1968 and first Brunello in 1971, and in the 1960s was among the first in Montalcino to use temperature-controlled stainless steel fermentation, a genuine innovation at the time that has since become the foundation of what's now considered one of the region's most traditional, purist styles. Since Nello's death in 2017, his grandsons Federico and Francesco Buffi have run the estate, farming the same ground and ageing the wines in large, neutral Slavonian oak built to let Montosoli speak rather than the winemaking.

Baricci's Montosoli sits on the cooler, north-facing side of Montalcino, and in the ripe, structured 2021 vintage that difference showed clearly: while much of the appellation leaned into weight and concentration, Baricci's Brunello held onto the vibrating minerality and freshness the site is known for. Kerin O'Keefe awarded it a perfect 100 points, describing layers of Morello cherry, licorice, blood orange and black raspberry over a backbone of refined, tightly woven tannins, lifted throughout by fresh acidity.