Wine
Luigi Bormioli gives shape to the song of wine
One of Italy’s titans of taste is on a mission – to turn your glass of wine from ordinary to extraordinary.
Hailing from the centre of Italy’s vinous and gastronomic heart, Parma, Luigi Bormioli has been crafting the highest quality glassware since 1946. Its current mission? To help everyday wine lovers discover the hidden music of wine, and how the right glass can unlock its fullest expression. Imagine: you’ve just uncorked a special bottle, one you’ve been saving.
Expectation builds as you pour it into your favourite glass. You take that first sip, and while it’s pleasant, something feels... missing. What you don’t realise is that you’ve just experienced one of the wine world’s best-kept secrets in reverse: the wrong glass has literally stolen half your wine’s potential.
Aromatic compositions
Up to 80 per cent of what we perceive as ‘taste’ actually comes from our sense of smell. Before liquid hits your taste buds, your olfactory system is detecting hundreds of aromatic compounds that create and ultimately shape the complex flavours that will flow across your palate.
This isn’t wine snobbery – it’s neuroscience. The human tongue can only detect five basic tastes: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and umami. Everything else – those notes of blackcurrant in your Cabernet, the honeyed stonefruit in your Chardonnay, the earthy forest floor in your Pinot Noir – comes through your nose, shaped by the form of the glass in which you’ve poured.
In short, when you use a generic glass, you’re essentially muffling this crucial aromatic composition, leaving money and pleasure on the table with every sip.
A stage of glass
When wine hits the glass, it begins an intricate duet with oxygen that transforms its character. The shape of your glass acts as a stage for this performance. To extend the metaphor, imagine wine aromas as instruments in an orchestra. The right glass acts as a conductor, ensuring each aromatic note hits at the right moment and intensity.
The wrong glass? It’s like having a tone-deaf baton-wielder steering things – certain aromas clash, others disappear entirely, and the beautiful symphony becomes a cacophonous mess.
Perfect pitch
Bordeaux and Rhne varieties: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec and Shiraz all love tall glasses with broad bowls that allow tannins to soften while concentrating the wine’s complex fruit and oak characteristics. Try: Luigi Bormioli Optica Bordeaux
Red and white Burgundy: Pinot Noir and Chardonnay demand a balloon-shaped bowl for their delicate, ephemeral aromatics while providing enough surface area for concentration and power to mingle and balance through appropriate aeration. Try: Luigi Bormioli Crescendo
Aromatic whites: Riesling, Pinot G and youthful unoaked wines elevate in glasses with slightly smaller bowls that concentrate their delicate floral and fruit notes, harmonising the palate against alcohol and acid-driven aromatics. Try: Luigi Bormioli Vinea Riesling
Champagne and sparkling wines: Tall, narrow flutes preserve bubbles and channel the wine’s crisp aromatics directly to your nose. High quality, aged sparklings thrive in glasses with a greater, tulip-like bowl, allowing complex fruit and autolytic characters to organise themselves. Try: Luigi Bormioli Vinoteque Perlage
Take a young Cabernet Sauvignon, for example. Pour it into a narrow glass, and the alcohol vapours might overwhelm the subtle fruit notes. An Optica Bordeaux glass from Luigi Bormioli, however, would see those those same alcohol vapours integrate beautifully with the wine’s complex bouquet, thanks to its flatter base acting as a decanter to the wine in the glass.
On the other hand, a bowl that’s too broad, with too wide an opening, might dissipate the delicate aromatics of your favourite white wine before they can reach your nose, affecting which taste receptors are activated first. Here, a glass with a smaller bowl and a narrower opening, such as a Vinea Riesling glass, is generally called for.
VIRTUOSOS OF SENSE
Luigi Bormioli has spent generations understanding the intricate relationship between glass and wine. As a result, its glasses aren’t just vessels; they’re designed to unlock specific characteristics in different wine varieties.
You don’t need to be a sommelier to experience the dramatic difference proper glassware makes, nor have a cabinet filled with glasses of all shapes and sizes. Start with one or two quality glasses designed for your favourite wine styles (see panel). Luigi Bormioli’s precisely crafted stemware makes this experimentation both affordable and enlightening. Begin with a simple test. Pour the same wine into different glasses and taste side by side: that Cabernet that seemed harsh in your generic glass suddenly reveals layers of complexity in proper Bordeaux stemware; the Chardonnay that felt flat transforms into a symphony of fruit and minerality.
Consider: if proper glassware can enhance your wine experience by even 30 per cent, you’re effectively getting more value from every bottle you open. A $20 bottle drunk from the right glass can outperform a $40 bottle in generic stemware. The mathematics might be compelling, but the sensory rewards are priceless.
Your wine deserves better than compromise, and so do you. Invest in quality stemware from Luigi Bormioli and discover what you’ve been missing. Your palate – and your wine cellar – will thank you.