August Wine Journal

”The year continues to lurch forward at breakneck speed! The summer season has been consistently hot, perfectly interspersed with rain along the way, meaning we’re looking at harvest being two to three weeks ahead of what we might consider a normal year.

Veraison is well underway, first spotted in the final few days of July, and now each day it seems another berry has miraculously changed colour overnight, bringing a new swathe of colour into the vineyard. For those not versed in this terminology, veraison is the time when the bunches of bright green berries begin to turn. Dusty pinks, bright cherry reds, heavy purples, and deep gold. It’s a beautiful process to watch.

As things shift outside, a game of cleaning Tetris has started inside. The summer is a downtime for the winery, so before harvest, we must dust off the cobwebs and JET WASH EVERYTHING. It’s not quite that simple, but the careful process of having every single piece of kit as clean as possible gives us the best possible chance of making the kind of wines we want to make. Working with minimal intervention does not always mean doing less, but acting with more attention to detail along the way. The old adage of ‘great wines are made in the vineyard’ might also read ‘great wines are made in clean wineries’…

One of the more exciting moments in this process has been the re-waxing of our Georgian qvevri. Something we are only doing for the first time since they arrived at Tillingham. An ancient method to reduce the porosity of the clay, whilst also acting as a natural antibacterial lining. With rollers and blowtorches feels a little punk, but the method seems effective. The comforting scent of beeswax has been tumbling out of the winery’s doors. Lovely to walk past.

Something that goes particularly well with the perfume of beeswax and English summer sunshine is a glass of rosé! We’re drinking all things pink to close out the summer holidays. We’d love to share that sentiment with you, so here’s a bundle of our PN23, Col ’23 PINK, and Rosé.”

You can BUY HERE

Wine manager | Tierney Beames