The City of Bristol's Backyard Vineyards: Foot-Stomping Grapes in City Spaces

Every quarter of an hour or so, an older diesel-powered train arrives at a spray-painted station. Close by, a law enforcement alarm pierces the almost continuous traffic drone. Commuters hurry past collapsing, ivy-covered fencing panels as storm clouds form.

It is perhaps the last place you anticipate to find a perfectly formed vineyard. However James Bayliss-Smith has managed to 40 mature vines sagging with round purplish grapes on a rambling allotment situated between a line of 1930s houses and a local rail line just north of the city downtown.

"I've noticed individuals concealing heroin or whatever in the shrubbery," states Bayliss-Smith. "But you just get on with it ... and continue caring for your vines."

Bayliss-Smith, 46, a documentary cameraman who also has a fermented beverage company, is not the only local vintner. He's organized a loose collective of cultivators who produce wine from four hidden city grape gardens tucked away in back gardens and allotments across Bristol. It is sufficiently underground to have an formal title yet, but the group's messaging chat is named Vineyard Dreams.

City Wine Gardens Around the Globe

To date, the grower's plot is the sole location listed in the City Vineyard Network's upcoming world atlas, which includes better-known city vineyards such as the 1,800 plants on the slopes of the French capital's renowned artistic district neighbourhood and over three thousand grapevines with views of and inside Turin. The Italian-based non-profit association is at the forefront of a movement re-establishing urban grape cultivation in traditional winemaking countries, but has discovered them throughout the globe, including cities in East Asia, Bangladesh and Central Asia.

"Grape gardens assist urban areas stay more eco-friendly and ecologically varied. They protect open space from development by establishing permanent, productive farming plots inside cities," explains the association's president.

Similar to other vintages, those created in cities are a product of the earth the plants grow in, the unpredictability of the weather and the individuals who care for the fruit. "Each vintage embodies the beauty, community, landscape and history of a city," adds the spokesperson.

Mystery Polish Variety

Back in the city, the grower is in a urgent timeline to harvest the vines he cultivated from a plant abandoned in his garden by a Polish family. If the rain comes, then the pigeons may take advantage to attack once more. "Here we have the enigmatic Polish variety," he comments, as he removes damaged and mouldy grapes from the glistering bunches. "The variety remains uncertain their exact classification, but they are certainly disease-resistant. Unlike premium grapes – Burgundy grapes, Chardonnay and other famous French grapes – you need not spray them with pesticides ... this is possibly a unique cultivar that was bred by the Soviets."

Collective Activities Throughout the City

Additional participants of the collective are additionally making the most of sunny interludes between bursts of autumn rain. On the terrace with views of Bristol's glistening waterfront, where historic trading ships once floated with barrels of vintage from Europe and Spain, one cultivator is collecting her rondo grapes from approximately fifty plants. "I love the aroma of these vines. It is so reminiscent," she remarks, pausing with a container of grapes slung over her shoulder. "It's the scent of southern France when you open the car windows on holiday."

Grant, 52, who has devoted more than 20 years working for charitable groups in conflict zones, inadvertently took over the grape garden when she moved back to the UK from East Africa with her family in recent years. She felt an overwhelming duty to look after the grapevines in the garden of their new home. "This vineyard has previously endured three different owners," she says. "I deeply appreciate the concept of natural stewardship – of handing this down to someone else so they can keep cultivating from this land."

Terraced Gardens and Traditional Winemaking

Nearby, the final two members of the collective are hard at work on the steep inclines of Avon Gorge. Jo Scofield has cultivated over one hundred fifty plants perched on ledges in her wild half-acre garden, which descends towards the muddy River Avon. "Visitors frequently express amazement," she notes, gesturing towards the interwoven vineyard. "It's astonishing to them they can see rows of vines in a city street."

Currently, Scofield, sixty, is picking clusters of dusty purple dark berries from rows of vines arranged along the hillside with the assistance of her daughter, Luca. The conservationist, a wildlife and conservation film-maker who has contributed to Netflix's nature programming and television network's gardening shows, was motivated to cultivate vines after seeing her neighbour's vines. She's discovered that amateurs can make interesting, enjoyable natural wine, which can command prices of upwards of seven pounds a serving in the growing number of establishments focusing on minimal-intervention wines. "It is incredibly satisfying that you can actually create good, traditional vintage," she says. "It's very on trend, but really it's reviving an traditional method of producing wine."

"During foot-stomping the grapes, the various natural microorganisms come off the skins into the juice," says Scofield, partially submerged in a container of small branches, pips and crimson juice. "This represents how wines were made traditionally, but industrial wineries add preservatives to kill the natural cultures and then add a commercially produced yeast."

Difficult Conditions and Creative Approaches

A few doors down active senior another cultivator, who inspired Scofield to plant her vines, has assembled his friends to pick Chardonnay grapes from the 100 vines he has laid out neatly across two terraces. The former teacher, a Lancashire-born PE teacher who taught at the local university cultivated an interest in viticulture on annual sporting trips to France. However it is a difficult task to cultivate Chardonnay grapes in the dampness of the valley, with temperature fluctuations sweeping in and out from the Bristol Channel. "I aimed to make Burgundian wines in this location, which is a bit bonkers," admits the retiree with a smile. "This variety is late to ripen and very sensitive to fungal infections."

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

The unpredictable Bristol climate is not the sole problem encountered by grape cultivators. Reeve has had to install a fence on