Congratulations to Andrea Forbicioni, IWS, for passing the Italian Wine Scholar exam with highest honors!
About Andrea:
Hi, I am Andrea Forbicioni DipWSET, IWS. I live in Perth, Australia.
I am a wine enthusiast, I am not a wine professional...yet. I work in IT right now but I wish to share my passion for wines (especially from less known grapes) and teach in an interactive way so that wine can be appreciated by everyone and not only by people with a certain level of experience or certification I feel the wine lovers and consumers all over the world need to know more about wines coming from non-international grapes, as there is a sense of uniqueness and tipicity in them that needs to be rediscovered. In that sense, I'd like to become an ambassador for less common grapes, as there is a wide heritage of lost grapes to preserve.
I obtained the WSET Diploma last March through the Sydney Wine Academy. That gave me a great overview on all the world's wine regions and a structured tasting approach. At the same time, I felt I wanted to deepen my knowledge of specific countries, especially countries like Italy that are unique in terms of indigenous grapes.
The IWS program helped me to extend my knowledge and made me aware of all the necessary information needed to understand Italian wines deeply, thanks to a 360-degree outlook on the Italian world of grapes and wines. I feel everyone that wants to become a wine expert needs to have a good knowledge of the Italian wine world, and the IWS program is a very useful tool to gain that precious knowledge. I am also thinking about enrolling to the SWS (Spanish Wine Scholar) program, to complement and deepen my knowledge gained through WSET and IWS. In a similar way to Italy, Spain is home to unique indigenous grapes, which need to be valued more than what they are currently.
In a world where everyone uses social media to talk and post about wines, it is important to have certification(s) as a stand out point, and the IWS will certainly help me to be recognized to the outside world as an Italian Wine Scholar. My Instagram and youtube channels are @vinomagister so please follow me as a start!
