With 1706 and 1007 guest rooms and suites respectively and over eighty dining destinations, the Wynn Palace and the Wynn Macau hotels and casinos are very much like small cities of their own, the only resorts worldwide with six individual Forbes Travel Guide (FTG) Five-Star awards. Brought to Macau by world-famous hotelier Steve Wynn of Las Vegas fame, the hotels are at the pinnacle of luxury, featuring exceptionally large Italian marble bathrooms, Bang & Olufsen speakers, gigantic floral creations ranging from large-scale sculptures to subtle florals in other areas, the Performance Lake which provides an incredible water, light, and sound show that attracts evening-time visitors from all over Macau, the Skycab (seating up to six people in air-conditioned comfort as they travel in style in a cable car over the lake closeby the city’s skyscrapers, and so much more.
The complex has already organized wine events in the past, namely on Chinese and Bordeaux wines, but had yet to venture into the world of Italian wine. Therefore, the hotel management called upon Ian D’Agata, the multi-award-winning wine writer generally recognized as the greatest living expert on Italian wine today to draw upon his over twenty years of experience setting up major wine shows and masterclasses all over the world. And so, from May 16 to May 18, the Wynn Palace and the Wynn Macau were the site of the Italian Wine Journey, launching together with D’Agata and his Ian D’Agata Wine Culture company an Italian wine event featuring a walk-around tasting, a masterclass with seventeen wines from all over Italy, a welcome reception dinner and four gourmet dinners, two dedicated to a panorama of great Italian wineries and two to the Supertuscans. The walk-around tasting so the owners, CEOs and management of the likes of Argiano, Benanti, Di Meo, Lorenzo Mattoni, Tedeschi, Tenuta di Trinoro, Zenato and other famous Italian wineries pour their wines. The two SuperTuscan dinners featured each evening a specific menu paired with: Castello di Pomino Riserva Il Benefizio 2022 (the 50th anniversary of this famous Italian wine), Argiano Solengo 2021, Ornellaia 2015, Tua Rita Redigaffi 2021, and Masseto 2011. The dinenrs devoted to a panorama of Italian wines featured the wines of Benanti, Castiglion del Bosco, Paolo Saracco, Santadi, Tedeschi, Tenuta di Trinoro and Trabucchi. The walk-around tasting proved a smashing success with the winery personnel taken aback but pleasantly surprised by the generally good level of Italian wine knowledge (a fascinating but admittedly complex subject) of Macau’s professionals. Especially popular was the ninety-minutes masterclass, a pre-course on Italian wine of the Ian D’Agata Wine Academy that organizes wine courses all over the world (and will soon be launching its courses here in Macau, besides mainland China, Italy and elsewhere), highlighting Barolo and Brunello, Chianti Classico and Amarone della Valpolicella, the Tuscan Coast and Etna, Montefalco and Sardinian wines, and more still. A one-hour long book signing session with Ian of one of his many award-winning books (The Grapes and Wines of Italy” The Definitive Compendium Region by Region’, co-written with his good friend Michele Longo).
THE INCREDIBLE VINO100 AND THE ITALIAN WINE WEEK IN SHANGHAI TO RUN FROM MAY 19 TO MAY 26
On Monday morning, May 19 , Ian D’Agata and his team flew back to Shanghai from Macau, to kick off the VINO100 Italian Wine Show and Italian Wine Week, that will run from May 19-May 26 with more than 50 Italian wineries pouring their wines, six prestigious masterclasses (verticals of Solengo, Tenuta di Trinoro Toscana Rosso, Tua Rita Redigaffi, Cogno Barolo Riserva Ravera Vigna Elena and Tenuta San Guido’s Le Difese, Guidalberto and Sassicaia), but also of winery dinners and solo presentations (Planeta, Cantina Bozen), B2B meetings for wineries specifically looking for an importer, wine shop tastings with six different wineries and much more. Just one of the may aspects of the Ian D’Agata Wine Academy that has as education and knowledge as its fundamental objective by which to promote, broadcast and increase the awareness and sales of quality wines, both Italian and international, all over the world. Stay tuned!
