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Every 20 minutes or so, an ageing diesel-powered train arrives at a graffiti-covered stop. Close by, a law enforcement alarm cuts through the almost continuous traffic drone. Commuters rush by collapsing, ivy-covered fencing panels as storm clouds gather.

It is perhaps the least likely spot you anticipate to find a perfectly formed vineyard. But one local grower has managed to four dozen established plants heavy with round purplish grapes on a sprawling garden plot sandwiched between a row of 1930s houses and a local rail line just north of Bristol town centre.

"I've seen people concealing illegal substances or whatever in those bushes," says the grower. "Yet you simply continue ... and continue caring for your vines."

Bayliss-Smith, forty-six, a documentary cameraman who runs a fermented beverage company, is not the only local vintner. He has pulled together a loose collective of cultivators who make wine from several discreet city grape gardens tucked away in private yards and allotments throughout the city. It is sufficiently underground to possess an official name so far, but the group's WhatsApp group is called Grape Expectations.

City Vineyards Across the Globe

So far, Bayliss-Smith's allotment is the only one listed in the Urban Vineyards Association's upcoming global directory, which includes better-known urban wineries such as the 1,800 vines on the slopes of the French capital's historic Montmartre area and more than three thousand vines with views of and inside Turin. Based in Italy non-profit association is at the vanguard of a movement re-establishing city vineyards in historic wine-producing nations, but has discovered them all over the globe, including cities in East Asia, Bangladesh and Uzbekistan.

"Vineyards assist urban areas stay greener and ecologically varied. They preserve open space from development by creating long-term, productive agricultural units inside cities," says the association's president.

Like all wines, those produced in urban areas are a result of the soils the vines grow in, the unpredictability of the climate and the individuals who care for the fruit. "Each vintage embodies the charm, local spirit, landscape and heritage of a urban center," notes the president.

Unknown Eastern European Grapes

Back in the city, Bayliss-Smith is in a urgent timeline to gather the vines he grew from a plant abandoned in his garden by a Polish family. Should the precipitation arrives, then the birds may take advantage to attack again. "This is the mystery Polish variety," he comments, as he removes bruised and rotten berries from the shimmering clusters. "We don't really know their exact classification, but they're definitely disease-resistant. Unlike noble varieties – Burgundy grapes, Chardonnay and other famous French grapes – you don't have to treat them with pesticides ... this is possibly a special variety that was developed by the Eastern Bloc."

Group Efforts Throughout Bristol

Additional participants of the group are also taking advantage of sunny interludes between showers of autumn rain. At a rooftop garden overlooking the city's glistening harbour, where medieval merchant vessels once bobbed with casks of vintage from Europe and Spain, one cultivator is collecting her dark berries from approximately fifty plants. "I love the smell of these vines. It is so reminiscent," she says, stopping with a basket of fruit slung over her arm. "It's the scent of southern France when you roll down the car windows on vacation."

The humanitarian worker, fifty-two, who has devoted more than 20 years working for humanitarian organizations in conflict zones, unexpectedly took over the grape garden when she returned to the United Kingdom from East Africa with her household in 2018. 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 explains. "I really like the idea of natural stewardship – of handing this down to someone else so they can keep cultivating from this land."

Sloping Gardens and Traditional Production

A short walk away, the final two members of the collective are busily laboring on the precipitous slopes of Avon Gorge. Jo Scofield has established over 150 plants perched on terraces in her expansive property, which tumbles down towards the silty River Avon. "People are always surprised," she says, gesturing towards the interwoven grape garden. "They can't believe they can see grapevine lines in a city street."

Currently, Scofield, sixty, is picking bunches of dusty purple dark berries from rows of plants slung across the hillside with the assistance of her child, her family member. Scofield, a documentary producer who has contributed to Netflix's nature programming and television network's Gardeners' World, was motivated to plant grapes after observing her neighbor's vines. She's discovered that amateurs can make intriguing, pleasurable traditional vintage, which can command prices of upwards of seven pounds a serving in the growing number of establishments focusing on minimal-intervention vintages. "It is incredibly satisfying that you can actually create good, traditional vintage," she says. "It is quite on trend, but really it's reviving an old way of producing vintage."

"When I tread the fruit, the various natural microorganisms are released from the surfaces and enter the juice," explains Scofield, partially submerged in a bucket of tiny stems, seeds and red liquid. "This represents how wines were made traditionally, but commercial producers add preservatives to eliminate the wild yeast and subsequently add a commercially produced yeast."

Difficult Conditions and Inventive Approaches

A few doors down sprightly retiree another cultivator, who inspired Scofield to establish her grapevines, has gathered his friends to harvest Chardonnay grapes from the 100 plants he has laid out neatly across multiple levels. Reeve, a northern English physical education instructor who worked at the local university cultivated an interest in wine on annual sporting trips to France. But it is a difficult task to cultivate this particular variety in the dampness of the valley, with cooling tides sweeping in and out from the Bristol Channel. "I aimed to make Burgundian wines here, which is somewhat ambitious," says Reeve with amusement. "This variety is late to ripen and particularly vulnerable to mildew."

"My goal was creating European-style vintages here, which is a bit bonkers"

The temperamental Bristol climate is not the sole problem encountered by winegrowers. The gardener has been compelled to install a barrier on