On the afternoon of January 4th, Arnaldo Caprai passed away at age of 92. With his passing, Italian wine world loses one of its most significant figures.
Armaldo Caprai was a renowned textile entrepreneur and the founder of Caprai winery: a leading figure in the world of wine thanks to the Sagrantino of Montefalco, whose relaunch he was one of the most important standard-bearers.
A Life in the textile sector - and in the wine
Born in 1933, Arnaldo Caprai began his extraordinary entrepreneurial adventure at the age of 22 as a salesman of trousseaus and household linen in Central Italy. A job carried out with passion, competence and a strong spirit of initiative. Over the years, he could achieve such a success that it pushes him to consolidate and expand his business, starting his own business and producing household linen himself. In 1964 he opened his first artisanal knitwear factory and in 1968, he created the Maglital company, later known throughout the world under the Cruciani brand.
In the same years, the entrepreneur's passion for lace artefacts emerged and he started to collect artifacts. Today the over 25,000 artifacts are part of the Museum Collection, regarded as "the most important collection of textile arts in the world".
In 2007 he also inaugurated the first Virtual Museum of Textile Arts, a pioneering intuition that earned him the Guggenheim Prize "Enterprise & Culture".
The Father of the Modern Sagrantino
But Arnaldo Caprai's worldwide fame is mainly linked to the wine Sagrantino di Montefalco . In the 1970s, when this indigenous Umbrian grape was still little known and almost forgotten, confined to a local dimension, he purchased 42 hectares in Montefalco, four of which had already been planted in the Val di Maggio estate, and passionately launched a visionary project to enhance the Sagrantino area.
«Our father bought the first part of this farm with the idea of producing Sagrantino because that was the wine that still made the difference in fame of this area at the time», the children say.
Year after year, the continuous search for production excellence and the constant commitment to process innovation – bringing the experience gained in the textile industry to the world of wine – establish the international success of the Sagrantino di Montefalco. This way, the company becomes a leader in the production of this extraordinary native grape variety, giving a decisive contribution to making Montefalco and its wine known throughout the world.
Today, the winery is run by his son Marco, who has combined his father's entrepreneurial spirit with a particular focus on innovation and environmental and social issues. They produce approximately 1 million bottles a year that have brought Sagrantino exported all over the world, with international recognition confirming its excellence.
Arnaldo Caprai's name will forever remain linked to the world of wine through his iconic bottles of Sagrantino, symbolizing a vision that has transformed a forgotten grape variety into a globally recognized excellence.