Marco Niepoort (Fio Wines): A thread between two worlds

A family shaped by wine

Marco Niepoort belongs to the sixth generation of one of Portugal's most storied wine dynasties. Founded in 1842 in Vila Nova de Gaia, the house built its name on Port before Dirk Niepoort, Marco's father, expanded its scope from 1987 onwards. Niepoort grew from a respected Port producer into a multi-region force, with vineyards across the Douro, Dão, Bairrada, and Vinho Verde. Marco and his brother Daniel grew up immersed in this restless culture, shaped by their father's conviction that partnership is a form of learning. Marco spent formative years in the Mosel before settling in Germany full-time, taking on the role of brand ambassador at Fio, a position the family acknowledges resists a cleaner job description.

Fio: where the Mosel meets the Douro

Fio was founded in 2016 as a joint venture between the Niepoort family and Piesport winemaker Philipp Kettern, whose family has farmed the Mosel for several hundred years. Dirk and his sons were drawn to the valley since Dirk's early friendship with the late Wilhelm Haag, who taught him that wines need not be rich or powerful to be wonderful. The two families met over a week of wine dinners; after an unusually candid exchange in which Dirk told Philipp directly that his existing wines were not what he wanted from the Mosel, they committed to building something new together. The name Fio means "thread" in Portuguese, stitching both families into a single project. Vineyards cover steep slate slopes in Piesport and Leiwen, with fruit from top sites including Göldtropfchen, Josephsberg, and Falkenberg. Farming runs without herbicides or chemical fertilisers; sheep graze the rows, and old vines trained on single poles, as in the Douro, form the backbone of the range.

We want to taste and release the wines when they are ready, not before.

Time as the missing ingredient

In the cellar, Fio works in old Mosel fuder barrels using native yeasts, without sulphur during vinification. Wines spend between one and three years on full lees before bottling, unfined and unfiltered, with minimal SO2 added at that final stage only. The range releases across multiple vintages simultaneously, because readiness, not calendar, dictates timing. Marco puts it plainly: Fio does not follow sales-driven logic. The wines are dry, rooted in old vine material, and carry the mineral character of slate soils farmed without chemical intervention. Labels in a Dalí-esque register signal the project's refusal of convention. For Marco, Fio represents a direct continuation of the Niepoort ethos: wine made slowly, from attentive farming and patient cellaring, speaks more clearly than wine made to meet a market.

Skurnik Wines & Spirits, "Fio". https://www.skurnik.com/producer/fio/

Decanter, "Niepoort: Producer profile and 10 top wines to try", September 2023. https://www.decanter.com/premium/niepoort-producer-profile-and-10-top-wines-to-try-501918/

World of Fine Wine, "Dirk van der Niepoort: Portugal's greatest winemaker?", June 2023. https://worldoffinewine.com/homepage-featured-articles/dirk-van-der-niepoort-portugal-greatest-winemaker

Flatiron Wines & Spirits, "Fio". https://flatiron-wines.com/blogs/producers/fio