Aug 24th, 2016

A Toast to Maintaining Inherited Wealth

Lamberto Frescobaldi sets two wine glasses atop a wooden barrel in the spacious cellar of his company's winery in a 1,000-year-old castle not far from Florence. Uncorking a bottle of Nipozzano, he takes a sip and nods. The red that his family supplied to Michelangelo and Pope Leo X still tastes pretty darn good. To Frescobaldi, 53, directing the family business is something of a trust. It’s a way to preserve a dynasty that began with wool traders in about the year 1000 and made its money financing the English crown almost 200 years later.