Kete Ora Trust sponsored biodynamic winemaker Katia Nussbaum to speak at the Organic and Biodynamic Winegrowing Conference in June 2025. The conference was attended by 270 delegates, with topics including climate change, water ecology, biodiversity, soil health, biodynamics, regenerative viticulture and more.
Katia Nussbaum and her husband, Luigi, produce their premium wine, San Polino Brunello di Montalcino in a rustic farmhouse in southern Tuscany, where they have been since 1990. A fervent believer in the power of regenerative viticulture, Katia uses her earlier training in social anthropology to critique our contemporary ways of seeing. Using her beloved vitiforestry project as a metaphor for the complexity of an interconnected universe, San Polino wines become pieces for performance art: unique expressions of territory in the context of time, nature and culture.
Katia gave two talks, firstly Rooted in change: Cultivating a new legacy in organic viticulture and secondly, The Living Vineyard: viti-forestry, mycelium networks and the awareness/awakeningof vine consciousness. Both offered interesting insights into her work and beliefs.
Katia has provided free access to her essay ‘Biodynamics - a new approach needed?’ hosted on wine critic Jancis Robinson’s website, which sets out to explain her thinking as the basis for her second presentation.
You can read more about the wine conference here.
Posted: 18 August 2025
