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Each quarter of an hour or so, an older diesel train pulls into a spray-painted stop. Nearby, a police siren pierces the near-constant traffic drone. Commuters hurry past falling apart, ivy-covered garden fences as storm clouds form.

It is maybe the last place you anticipate to find a perfectly formed grape-growing plot. However James Bayliss-Smith has managed to 40 mature vines heavy with round purplish berries on a rambling garden plot sandwiched between a line of 1930s houses and a local rail line just north of the city town centre.

"I've seen individuals hiding illegal substances or whatever in those bushes," says the grower. "Yet you just get on with it ... and keep tending to your vines."

Bayliss-Smith, 46, a filmmaker who also has a kombucha drinks business, is not the only local vintner. He has organized a informal group of growers who produce wine from several discreet urban vineyards nestled in back gardens and allotments throughout Bristol. The project is too clandestine to have an formal title so far, but the group's messaging chat is named Grape Expectations.

Urban Wine Gardens Around the World

To date, the grower's allotment is the only one registered in the City Vineyard Network's upcoming global directory, which features more famous city vineyards such as the 1,800 vines on the slopes of Paris's historic Montmartre area and over 3,000 vines overlooking and within the Italian city. The Italian-based non-profit association is at the forefront of a movement re-establishing urban grape cultivation in historic wine-producing nations, but has identified them all over the world, including cities in Japan, South Asia and Central Asia.

"Grape gardens help cities stay more eco-friendly and ecologically varied. These spaces preserve land from development by creating long-term, yielding farming plots inside urban environments," says the association's president.

Similar to other vintages, those created in urban areas are a result of the earth the plants grow in, the unpredictability of the weather and the people who care for the grapes. "A bottle of wine represents the beauty, community, environment and history of a urban center," notes the spokesperson.

Unknown Polish Variety

Returning to the city, the grower is in a race against time to harvest the grapevines he cultivated from a plant abandoned in his allotment by a Eastern European household. If the rain arrives, then the pigeons may take advantage to attack again. "This is the mystery Polish variety," he comments, as he cleans damaged and mouldy grapes from the shimmering bunches. "The variety remains uncertain their exact classification, but they are certainly hardy. In contrast to noble varieties – Burgundy grapes, white wine grapes and additional renowned European varieties – you need not spray them with pesticides ... this could be a special variety that was developed by the Eastern Bloc."

Collective Activities Across Bristol

The other members of the group are additionally taking advantage of bright periods between showers of fall precipitation. At a rooftop garden overlooking the city's shimmering waterfront, where medieval merchant vessels once bobbed with casks of vintage from France and the Iberian peninsula, one cultivator is collecting her rondo grapes from about fifty plants. "I adore the aroma of these vines. The scent is so evocative," she remarks, stopping with a container of fruit resting on her shoulder. "It recalls the fragrance of southern France when you roll down the car windows on holiday."

The humanitarian worker, fifty-two, who has devoted more than 20 years working for charitable groups in conflict zones, inadvertently inherited the grape garden when she moved back to the UK from Kenya with her household in 2018. She felt an overwhelming duty to maintain the grapevines in the yard of their new home. "This vineyard has previously endured multiple proprietors," she explains. "I deeply appreciate the idea of natural stewardship – of passing this on to future caretakers so they keep cultivating from this land."

Sloping Vineyards and Traditional Production

A short walk away, the remaining cultivators of the group are busily laboring on the precipitous slopes of the local river valley. Jo Scofield has established more than one hundred fifty vines perched on terraces in her wild half-acre garden, which descends towards the muddy River Avon. "Visitors frequently express amazement," she says, indicating the tangled grape garden. "It's astonishing to them they are viewing rows of vines in a city street."

Today, the filmmaker, 60, is harvesting clusters of dusty purple dark berries from lines of vines slung across the cliff-side with the help of her daughter, her family member. The conservationist, a documentary producer who has contributed to streaming service's nature programming and television network's gardening shows, was inspired to plant grapes after observing her neighbour's grapevines. She has learned that hobbyists can produce interesting, pleasurable traditional vintage, which can sell for upwards of seven pounds a serving in the increasing quantity of wine bars focusing on minimal-intervention vintages. "It's just deeply rewarding that you can truly create quality, natural wine," she says. "It is quite on trend, but really it's resurrecting an old way of making wine."

"During foot-stomping the grapes, all the wild yeasts are released from the surfaces and enter the liquid," says Scofield, ankle deep in a bucket of small branches, pips and crimson juice. "This represents how wines were made traditionally, but industrial wineries introduce preservatives to eliminate the wild yeast and then incorporate a lab-grown culture."

Difficult Conditions and Inventive Approaches

In the immediate vicinity active senior Bob Reeve, who inspired Scofield to plant her vines, has assembled his companions to harvest white wine varieties from the 100 vines he has laid out neatly across two terraces. Reeve, a Lancashire-born PE teacher who worked at Bristol University cultivated an interest in wine on regular visits to France. However it is a difficult task to grow Chardonnay grapes in the humidity of the gorge, with temperature fluctuations moving through from the nearby estuary. "I wanted to make Burgundian wines in this location, which is a bit bonkers," says the retiree with a smile. "This variety is slow-maturing and particularly vulnerable to mildew."

"My goal was creating European-style vintages in this environment, which is rather ambitious"

The unpredictable Bristol climate is not the sole challenge encountered by grape cultivators. Reeve has been compelled to erect a fence on