Bristol's Backyard Vineyards: Grape-Treading Grapes in City Gardens

Each quarter of an hour or so, an older diesel train arrives at a spray-painted station. Nearby, a law enforcement alarm pierces the almost continuous traffic drone. Daily travelers rush by collapsing, ivy-covered garden fences as rain clouds gather.

This is perhaps the least likely spot you expect to find a well-established vineyard. However James Bayliss-Smith has cultivated four dozen established plants sagging with plump purplish grapes on a sprawling garden plot sandwiched between a row of historic homes and a local rail line just above the city town centre.

"I've seen individuals hiding illegal substances or other items in the shrubbery," says the grower. "But you just get on with it ... and keep tending to your vines."

Bayliss-Smith, forty-six, a documentary cameraman who also has a fermented beverage company, is among several local vintner. He has pulled together a informal group of growers who make vintage from four discreet city grape gardens tucked away in private yards and allotments across the city. The project is sufficiently underground to have an formal title yet, but the collective's messaging chat is named Vineyard Dreams.

Urban Vineyards Around the World

So far, the grower's plot is the sole location listed in the City Vineyard Network's forthcoming global directory, which includes more famous urban wineries such as the 1,800 plants on the slopes of the French capital's historic artistic district neighbourhood and over 3,000 vines with views of and inside the Italian city. Based in Italy non-profit association is at the forefront of a movement reviving city vineyards in historic wine-producing countries, but has identified them all over the globe, including urban centers in Japan, South Asia and Central Asia.

"Vineyards help cities stay greener and ecologically varied. They protect land from construction by establishing permanent, productive farming plots within cities," explains the association's president.

Like all wines, those produced in cities are a product of the earth the plants thrive in, the vagaries of the climate and the individuals who care for the grapes. "A bottle of wine embodies the beauty, local spirit, landscape and history of a urban center," adds the president.

Unknown Polish Grapes

Returning to Bristol, Bayliss-Smith is in a urgent timeline to gather the grapevines he cultivated from a cutting left in his allotment by a Eastern European household. Should the precipitation comes, then the birds may take advantage to attack once more. "This is the mystery Eastern European variety," he comments, as he cleans damaged and mouldy grapes from the glistering bunches. "The variety remains uncertain their exact classification, but they're definitely disease-resistant. Unlike premium grapes – Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and other famous European varieties – you don't have to treat them with pesticides ... this is possibly a unique cultivar that was bred by the Eastern Bloc."

Group Efforts Throughout the City

Additional participants of the group are also making the most of sunny interludes between bursts of autumn rain. At a rooftop garden overlooking Bristol's glistening waterfront, where medieval merchant vessels once bobbed with barrels of vintage from Europe and Spain, Katy Grant is harvesting her rondo grapes from about fifty vines. "I love the aroma of the grapevines. The scent is so evocative," she remarks, pausing with a container of fruit resting on her shoulder. "It recalls the fragrance of Provence when you roll down the vehicle windows on vacation."

The humanitarian worker, fifty-two, who has devoted more than two decades working for charitable groups in war-torn regions, unexpectedly inherited the grape garden when she returned to the UK from Kenya with her family in recent years. She felt an strong responsibility to look after the vines in the yard of their new home. "This vineyard has already survived three different owners," she explains. "I really like the concept of natural stewardship – of passing this on to future caretakers so they continue producing from this land."

Sloping Vineyards and Traditional Production

A short walk away, the remaining cultivators of the collective are busily laboring on the precipitous slopes of the local river valley. One filmmaker has established over 150 vines situated on terraces in her wild half-acre garden, which descends towards the silty River Avon. "Visitors frequently express amazement," she notes, gesturing towards the tangled vineyard. "They can't believe they can see rows of vines in a city street."

Today, the filmmaker, 60, is harvesting bunches of dusty purple dark berries from rows of plants arranged along the cliff-side with the assistance of her daughter, Luca. The conservationist, a wildlife and conservation film-maker who has contributed to streaming service's Great National Parks series and BBC Two's gardening shows, was motivated to plant grapes after observing her neighbour's vines. She has learned that amateurs can make interesting, pleasurable traditional vintage, which can sell for upwards of £7 a serving in the growing number of establishments specialising in low-processing wines. "It's just deeply rewarding that you can actually make quality, natural wine," she says. "It is quite fashionable, but really it's resurrecting an old way of producing wine."

"During foot-stomping the fruit, all the natural microorganisms are released from the surfaces into the juice," says Scofield, partially submerged in a bucket of tiny stems, pips and crimson juice. "This represents how vintages were historically produced, but industrial wineries add preservatives to kill the natural cultures and subsequently incorporate a lab-grown yeast."

Challenging Environments and Inventive Approaches

In the immediate vicinity active senior another cultivator, who inspired his neighbor to plant her grapevines, has assembled his friends to pick Chardonnay grapes from the 100 vines he has laid out neatly across multiple levels. Reeve, a Lancashire-born PE teacher who taught at the local university developed a passion for viticulture on regular visits to Europe. But it is a difficult task to grow Chardonnay grapes in the dampness of the gorge, with cooling tides moving through from the Bristol Channel. "I wanted to make French-style vintages here, which is somewhat ambitious," says Reeve with a smile. "Chardonnay is slow-maturing and very sensitive to fungal infections."

"I wanted to make European-style vintages in this environment, which is a bit bonkers"

The temperamental Bristol climate is not the only problem encountered by winegrowers. Reeve has had to install a fence on