Marche – just behind the knee

If the map of Italy is a thigh-high boot, Marche is the soft leather bit, just behind the knee. Appropriate, perhaps, for the home of Italian leather (shoes and handbags, anyone?). Equally appropriate for its behind-the-knee status on the global wine map.

Framed on one side by the infinity-blue of the Adriatic sea, and on the other by the spine of the Apennines, it’s an unassuming landscape of soft hills, dotted with...