The history of English and Welsh wines

As the story goes,

there has been three main periods of viticulture in the history of the UK.

The first dates back to the Romano-British empire, of which we identified the remains of seven vineyards so far: four in Northamptonshire, one in Cambridgeshire, one in Lincolnshire and one in Buckinghamshire. But this is just the tip of the iceberg, as research for evidence of ancient vineyards is still in its very early stages. We could in fact be looking at up to 250 square miles of Roman Britain involved in grape and wine production, making it a major player in the industry at the time.

But forget ordering a nice crisp Chardonnay from your local tavern or popina (wine bar)...

Britannia Nouveau, as some like to call it, would have looked somewhat different to your usual 125ml glass of house white.

For starters, rainfall was about 40% lower and the climate much warmer. They would have harvested their grapes quite early, before they were fully ripe, and added loads of honey to them during pressing instead. The wine would have then been stored away to ferment in amphorae or barrels, for drinking within six months.

So, really, you would have been looking at at brown coloured wine, very sweet to taste and relatively low in alcohol, only available during winter and spring. Brown! Yeah, maybe we would have stuck to ale too… One thing’s for sure, wine grown throughout the Empire was definitely brought into the UK (and, we hope, included some nice Italian reds to pair with their hare stew dinner). Whether the vines they brought here with them filled many glasses remains debatable. Some say they actually played more of a symbolic role, reminding the Romans of home and representing the source of their prosperity.

Fast forward to the Norman Conquest and Middle Ages, where we’re now counting over 100 vineyards either owned by the crown, noble families or the Church. We get this information from the Domesday Book, a 1087 census commissioned by the new Norman king to assess, amongst other things, the size of his farms and population, but also making a special note of both existing vineyards and new vines being planted.

Long story short, the Normans likes their wine (and who can blame them!)

A cooling of the climate from the 13th century onwards and the dissolution of the monasteries in 1536 led to a clear decline of wine production, with only a very few die-hard winemakers desperately holding on to their barrels. But it only got worse for our vineyards, with an all-time low in the 1800s of only 8 on record.

The 1950s thankfully saw a revival of the industry, led forward by a few pioneers wanting to disprove the widespread belief that making wine in our climate simply wasn’t a good idea. As part of this movement, the first modern commercial vineyard of Hambledon in Hampshire was planted - making today some of our favourite sparkling wine!

Research stations were established in Surrey and around the country, testing over 600 grape varieties

brought in from Europe, Russia and the US such as Muller-Thurgau and Seyval Blanc.

Over several decades they established more suitable growing techniques and better disease control, specially developed for these new varieties in their new environment. But the expansion of new vineyards was painfully slow, at least until the 60s and 70s. Coming as a bit of a blessing, 1976 happened to be a particularly good year for winemaking, encouraging a number of enthusiasts to give it a go. But it would be far from smooth sailing, with the 80s presenting quite a challenge of good years followed by bad ones.

Thankfully, producers didn’t give up that easily and with the commercialisation of the industry we’re now producing 5 million bottles a year. English wines received a total of 365 awards in 2015, with English sparkling wine beating French champagne in several blind tastings. This increased success and growing international recognition has seen even France’s Taittinger decide to plant over 1 million vines in Kent over the next 12 months.

The vineyard count is at an all time high, with over 500 across England and Wales, exporting £480 million’s worth of wine last year.

An exciting time for UK wines? We definitely think so!