Milan – A high-profile wine theft has shaken the Milanese restaurant scene. At the Affinatore restaurant on Via Piero della Francesca, two men struck and made off with bottles of the famous Domaine Romanée-Conti—total value: over 280,000 euros. The heist took place during the day, professionally planned and executed in a flash.
Disguised as a construction worker
The perpetrators were wearing helmets and high-visibility vests. This wasn’t an unusual sight, as there is a construction site right in front of the restaurant. Thanks to this ruse, they blended right into the street scene. In the surveillance video that the restaurant posted on Instagram, the two can be seen deliberately cutting two holes in the laminated safety glass and then removing the bottles. The loot disappeared into a toolbox. By the time the alarm went off and security arrived, the men were long gone.
One of the most expensive plants in the world
Domaine Romanée-Conti is among the most sought-after wines in the world. The estate cultivates a tiny plot in the Burgundian village of Vosne-Romanée, produces exclusively Pinot Noir, and yields only small quantities each year. A bottle from the 1945 vintage recently sold for $812,500 at an auction in New York—a world record.
According to an Instagram post by the restaurant, they are not letting the break-in get them down. They plan to replace the stolen bottles, repair the damage, and publish the serial numbers of the stolen wine bottles to make it harder to resell them. While a theft may take away the wine, it cannot take away the passion and years of work that have gone into the business.
