The History of English Wine

For most of history, English wine was a joke — thin, sour stuff made in a cold, damp country better suited to beer. Not any more. On the same chalk that gives Champagne its greatness, and helped along by a warming climate, southern England now makes sparkling wine so good it beats Champagne at its own game. It is one of the most remarkable turnarounds in the wine world¹.

Two thousand years of English vines

The Romans planted the first English vines, and after them the medieval monasteries kept viticulture alive: the Domesday Book of 1086 recorded dozens of vineyards, many attached to religious houses. But a cooling climate and Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries snuffed the tradition out, and for centuries English wine was little more than an eccentric experiment¹.

The modern revival

The comeback began quietly after the Second World War. In 1952 Sir Guy Salisbury-Jones planted a vineyard at Hambledon in Hampshire — the first commercial vineyard in England since the Middle Ages — and sold his first bottles in 1954. Through the 1960s and ’70s a scattering of small growers followed across Sussex, Kent and Surrey, mostly making light, aromatic still whites².

The Champagne chalk

The great discovery was underground. A band of chalk runs across southern England from Hampshire through Sussex to the white cliffs of Dover — and it is the very same Cretaceous chalk that surfaces in Champagne, on the Côte des Blancs. Growers realised that England’s cool, marginal climate and Champagne’s soils were a natural match for one thing above all: fine sparkling wine³.

The chalk beneath Sussex is the same seam that runs under Champagne itself.— on English sparkling terroir³

The sparkling revolution

In 1988 an American couple, Stuart and Sandy Moss, planted the classic Champagne grapes — Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier — at Nyetimber in West Sussex, and made England’s first world-class traditional-method sparkling wine. Others followed, and in a series of blind tastings English fizz began to beat Champagne outright, culminating in Nyetimber and its rivals taking the very top international sparkling prizes⁴.

The French are coming

The ultimate compliment came from Champagne itself. In 2015 the grand house of Taittinger bought land in Kent to plant its own English vineyard, Domaine Evremond — the first Champagne house to do so — and others have looked north too. When Champagne’s own producers start planting in England, the world takes notice⁵.

A warming future

Climate change is the quiet engine of it all. As the world warms, southern England has crept into the sweet spot for cool-climate viticulture, and the industry has boomed — sparkling wine now makes up the great majority of production, with still wines improving fast behind it. Once a punchline, English wine has become one of the most exciting stories in the vineyard⁶.

Frequently asked questions

Read more

• Champagne, England’s chalk cousin across the Channel
• Chardonnay, key to English sparkling
• The French benchmark

References

1. Encyclopaedia Britannica — England. www.britannica.com ↩
2. Hambledon Vineyard — History of English Wine. hambledonvineyard.co.uk ↩
3. Wine-Searcher — English Sparkling Wine. www.wine-searcher.com ↩
4. WineGB — Great Britain’s Wine Industry. www.winegb.co.uk ↩
5. Champagne Taittinger — Domaine Evremond. www.taittinger.com ↩
6. Wanderlust Wine — English Wine Guide to Regions, Grapes and Styles. wanderlustwine.co.uk ↩

Recommended reading

Vintage: The Story of Wine
Hugh Johnson
A British writer’s sweep of world wine, England included.

A Short History of Wine
Rod Phillips
Good on climate, chalk and the making of cool-climate wine.

As an Amazon Associate, This Day in Wine History earns from qualifying purchases. Book recommendations are chosen independently.