Location: Platt, Weinviertel
Hectares: 18 (plus 90ha of mixed ag farmland)
Farming: Certified biodynamic
Winemaking: Combination of barrel and stainless, wild yeasts, some wines with skin contact, low to no sulfur

Siblings Rudi and Sophie Fidesser come from 700 years of winemaking in Platt, a tiny village in the Weinviertel, just a stone’s throw from the Czechia border, surrounded by hundreds of hectares of farmland. Weinviertel is Austria’s biggest growing region and over half of the Grüner Veltliner grown in Austria is planted here. It’s bordered by the more famous regions of Lower Austria (Wachau, Kamptal, Kremstal) in the south, Czechia and Slovakia to the north and east respectively, and the Waldviertel (cooling forests) to the west.

Platt is an ancient Celtic settlement and it’s believed wine has been made here since the Celts settled the area. While it’s relatively flat and expansive, this part of Weinviertel has very distinct soils of sand, marl, loess, granite, and limestone that differ from village to village. Nearly everyone in Platt (population is about 600 people) has some vines for home production, but there are only 10 families left that make wine for commercial purposes, and 6 of them are certified organic, which is really fantastic for the region.

Rudi and Sophie’s parents grew up in farming and winemaking and were the first to become certified organic in 1993. They have a modest 18 hectares planted to vines and another 90 for grains and open farmland, and after many years of working their land organically, they converted fully to biodynamics in 2014. While they don’t raise any cattle on their farm, they do trade grains with a neighbor in exchange for cow manure for the vines. They also sell grains to winemaking friends who happen to brew beer, trying to keep a little bit of their good work within their wine community.

While cool air blows across Weinviertel from the forested Waldviertel, this is an arid, hot region with very little rainfall. As such, most vineyards struggle to grow cover crops and there’s loads of competition in the vine rows for water and nutrients. The Fidesser’s never plow so they can keep as much nutrients in their soils as possible. Depending on the vintage, they’ll seed to promote cover crop growth, and disease pressure here is low aside from downy mildew.

The Fidesser winery is at their parents’ home in Platt, a very traditional space with a big gate and center courtyard that’s perfectly shaded and planted with fruit trees. The house is on one side of the courtyard and the former barn, now the cellar, is on the other. They actually press their fruit at grandmother’s house, just up the street, but ferment and age at the home cellar. 

While honoring the traditional single-variety style of the family’s Weingut Fidesser label, Rudi and Sophie created their own label, Fidesser*Orbis, where they feel free to experiment with pet nat, skin contact, and some zero-sulfur wines. All of the Orbis wines are also blends of various varieties grown on the farm.