English Wine Week gathers interest
English Wine Week, the countrywide campaign to promote English wines and vineyards, kicks off on Saturday 24th May. With the growing interest in English wine, so the celebration of our home-grown grape is gathering momentum. A host of activities are being offered by vineyards across the country, including tours, tastings and special events. Wine merchants, restaurants, pubs and hotels will also be running their own promotions featuring English wines.
The initiative is organised by English Wine Producers and co-sponsored by Food from Britain and this year’s diary of events includes everything from a tutored blind tasting to compare English sparkling wine with champagne at RidgeView Wine Estate in Sussex to rather less-wine-focussed pastimes, such as trying belly dancing at Sharpham Vineyard in Devon.
Julia Trustram Eve, marketing director of English Wine Producers, told ThirtyFifty that, ‘The Devon vineyards have really got themselves together this year to offer some inventive and fun things.’ They have their own website to check out the timetable of events (www.devonwineweek.co.uk).
A full run-down of all that’s going on during English Wine Week is available on the (www.englishwineweek.co.uk website and English Wine Producers has also just published a map of the vineyards of England and Wales, which you can get free via (www.englishwineproducers.com.
Julia said, ‘English Wine Week is just the right occasion to raise a glass to English wines and the summer ahead.’
For those who want to learn more generally about our wine, three books are being published this summer. The release of Grape Britain by David Harvey coincides with English Wine Week, while Stephen Skelton’s The Wines of Britain & Ireland and a book on the vineyards of England and Wales by David Moore and Philip Williamson, the duo who wrote the Wine Behind the Label series, will be available later in the year.
