Wine production and trade formed the bedrock of the economic and social progress in the Etna area from the Eighteenth Century up until the turn of the Twentieth Century, a time when the winegrowing witnessed a vast expansion, influencing investment choices, architecture, human activities, crafts, and transport. The great travellers of the Nineteenth Century described the foothills of Mount Etna as a genuine Mediterranean garden, where the vineyards carpeted the whole territory, stretching upward from the coast to the hills.

The great manor houses and the wines presses, built during that time, became features of the Etna countryside and still characterize it today.

The gradual recovery and the substantial investments made over last decade have been bringing back to life countless jewels of traditional architecture: wine cellars, terraces, dry stone walls, ancient passages between vineyards and small towers, wonderful examples of construction techniques