Cantine Florio

Vast 19th-century wine cellars of the Florio dynasty

Cantine Florio occupies a long, low building on the coast south of the old town: parallel stone barrel halls more than 150 metres long, filled with thousands of oak casks of Marsala ageing under the wooden roof. The complex is now part of the Illva Saronno group but is still working, and the guided tour is the best of the cellar visits in Marsala.

The visit covers the history of the family — central to 19th-century Sicilian industry and politics — the wine-making process, and a tasting of several styles, from dry Vergine to the dessert Riserva. Reservations are essential; tours run in Italian and English several times a day.

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A story
Vincenzo Florio built these cellars in 1833 to compete with the English producers Woodhouse and Ingham, who dominated the Marsala trade. Within a generation the Florios had bought both rivals out, turned Marsala into a global brand, and gone on to own steamship lines, tuna fisheries, and a chunk of Sicily.

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