The English Wine Diaries

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Sibylla Tindale, co-founder of High Clandon Estate in the heart of the Surrey Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.  Sibylla and her husband, Bruce, founded the boutique vineyard, which sits on a chalky-limestone hill, 20 years ago with the aim of producing only aged vintage sparkling wine to rival – and even surpass...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Richard Gladwin of "Local & Wild" a restaurant group co-founded with his brother, Oliver, which celebrates seasonal, sustainable dining inspired by their countryside upbringing on the family farm and vineyard, Nutbourne in West Sussex.  Together, they have a portfolio of five London restaurants, which each...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Jeany Cronk, co-founder of Mirabeau.  Born in Munich, Jeany moved to the UK for secondary school and later studied at the London School of Economics. A career in tech Marketing followed, where she met her husband, Stephen in 1997, and together they have three children.  Life in the leafy suburbs of South London was good...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Laura Riches, co-founder of wine brand Laylo.  Laura was previously the marketing director at Naked Wines, the UK's largest direct-to-consumer wine brand and, during her tenure, was responsible for record-breaking years of customer retention through a focus on customer engagement and storytelling. In November 2020,...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Sandy Booth, life-long farmer and owner of B58 Winery in Beaulieu, Hampshire.  Sandy founded the B58 Winery off the back of his hugely successful soft fruit farming business, after realising that his knowledge and innovative approach to growing fruit in polytunnels could also be applied to growing grape varieties that ar...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome to a new series of The English Wine Diaries and my first guest to join me to talk about all things English wine in 2025 is Trevor Clough, CEO and head blender of Digby Fine English.  Trevor and his husband, Jason Humphries, launched their first Digby wines for sale in 2013 having swapped the corporate grind of London for Sussex, in the heart of English wine country.  Impel...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on the last episode of season 11 of The English Wine Diaries is Mark Darley, founder and owner of All Angels Vineyard in Newbury, Berkshire.  Mark and his family became custodians of Church Farm in 2009 and, while it was still earlyish days for English wine back then, talks around the dinner table soon turned to planting a vineyard.  When the farmland was analysed as id...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Luke Spalding General Manager at Everflyht Vineyard in East Sussex.  With a background in wine studies from Plumpton Wine Division, and having worked at nearby vineyard, Ridgeview, Luke joined the Everflyht single vineyard estate in 2019 just two years after owners Ben and Sam Ellis planted the first vines.  As well as p...

Send us Fan Mail On today’s episode of the English Wine Diaries is Laura Robinson and Mathew Abbey from Burn Valley Vineyard in Norfolk.  Laura’s family moved to Crossways Farm in North Creake in October 1989, but it wasn’t until 2016 that they decided to plant vines on their land, harvesting their first crop after the hot summer of 2018.  Since then, they have built and expanded a winery and deve...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of the English Wine Diaries is award-winning wine expert and social media sensation, Tom Gilbey.  The Gilbey name is synonymous with wine and spirits. The Gilbey family were the first English family to buy a vineyard in Bordeaux in 1875 and subsequently became the most prominent wine and spirits merchant in the UK, selling one in every three bottles o...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Richard Balfour-Lynn, co-founder of Balfour Winery in Kent.   Following an education at Westminster School and the City of London Business School, Richard set up his first business at 24 years old – his early business interests ranged from Irish linen and lace to medical diagnostic centres and air conditioning companies,...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on this week's episode of The English Wine Diaries is Johnny Stanford, chef patron of Tern Restaurant in Worthing.  Manchester born and bred, Johnny began his career working with Paul Kitching at his acclaimed restaurant Juniper in Altrincham, before heading to Cumbria, then Edinburgh and finally settling in Sussex in 2012.  Johnny worked as sous chef at the Michel...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Mary Bridges , head winemaker and vineyard visionary at Gusbourne. Mary grew up near Inverness in Scotland in a farming family, where her love of the land developed from an early age, along with an instinct for the flavour alchemy created by good wine. She started her career in hospitality and quickly became enthused wit...

Send us Fan Mail We're back with series 11 of The English Wine Diaries and kick starting this season is The Mistress of Wine, aka Sam Caporn MW.  Not only is Sam one of just 421 Masters of Wine world-wide, (of which there are only 149 women) she was also the recipient of the 2011 Madame Bollinger Medal for Excellence in Tasting and remains one of just 16 women to have received the medal to da...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on the last episode of series 10 of The English Wine Diaries is wine expert and presenter, Tom Surgey.   Tom was just 14 when his career in hospitality started, peeling carrots and potatoes in a Sussex pub after school. At the tender age of 20, he found himself working at The Ivy in London, where a hero called Sancho taught him the basics of wine and his passion for the...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Michael Kennedy , Chief Executive Officer of Roebuck Estates – who make premium sparkling wine from their multi-vineyard estates in Sussex. Following university, Michael joined the Graduate Management Scheme of Marks and Spencer, and became the first trainee manager to be appointed to an overseas position in Paris. After...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is David Bailey – the owner of Wraxall Vineyard in Somerset.  David and his wife, Lexa Hunt bought Wraxall – thought to be the oldest vineyard in Somerset – in February 2021 having moved into the neighbouring 200-year-old farmhouse a few years earlier.  The couple, who have both run and grown businesses within the financial...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on this week's episode of The English Wine Diaries is John Wilkins, Commercial Director at Itasca Wines and Penn Croft Vineyards in Hampshire.  Itasca Wines is a sustainable full contract winemaking company, which under the lead of award-winning winemaker Ben Smith, delivers a grape to bottle service for a host of top wine brands and premium boutique vineyards acro...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is none other than Blur bassist, Alex James. Blur formed in 1988 and their nine studio albums have all topped the charts in the UK, generating numerous hit singles along the way including Song 2, Beetlebum and Coffee & TV. Now you may be wondering why a member of one of the most successful and influential bands of the 9...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Will Perkins, winemaker for Louis Pommery England , the English project under the Vranken-Pommery portfolio, which has planted 35-hectares of vines on the Pinglestone Estate in Hampshire.  Having grown up in Hampshire, just outside Winchester, Will has fond memories of formative years in the county and it was here that h...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is winemaker Charlie Holland.  Charlie worked his first vintage in Australia some 24 years ago and caught the wine bug. He returned to England and immediately enrolled at the renowned Plumpton College in Sussex.  While there he worked part-time at nearby Ridgeview wine estate before heading off to do winemaking stints in Ca...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome back to Series 10 of The English wine Diaries. Joining me on the first episode of this series are Katie and Umut Yesil from Riverview Crouch Valley Vineyard in Essex.   Prior to planting their vineyard in the now famed Crouch Valley, the couple ran a food and drink PR business in London, but following a conversation around the kitchen table with Katie’s father Billy – a th...

Send us Fan Mail Joining me on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Art Tukker, owner of Tinwood Estate in West Sussex.  The Tukker family farm, which is situated in the hamlet of Halnacker, near Chichester, has a history of growing lettuce but when Art took over in 2006, he had other ideas.  While studying agriculture and farming at university, it dawned on Art that growing vines could...

Send us Fan Mail In this special episode of The English Wine Diaries, brought to you in partnership with Coravin, I am joined by the company's inventor and founder Greg Lambrecht.   Having had a successful career in medical technologies and engineering degrees from MIT, Greg combined his knowledge of medical-grade needles with his passion for wine to develop a unique preservation system that...

Send us Fan Mail My guest on today’s episode of The English Wine Diaries is Sarah Massey, the esteemed head winemaker at Lyme Bay Winery in Axeminster, in Devon.  Sarah’s interest in winemaking was sparked at an early age and, after completing her Wine Business degree at Plumpton College, she embarked on a remarkable career, working harvests around the world before arriving at Lyme Bay Winery in 2...