Inside the 2024 harvest at Nyetimber, England’s finest sparkling wine producer

England’s leading sparkling wine producer recently completed its 2024 harvest. Given that this year gave the UK record-breaking amounts of rain, we asked the team at Nyetimber how they dealt with the challenging conditions, and just what we can expect from the wines.

Partner story with Nyetimber.

It’s no secret that 2024 proved tricky for winemakers in England. “Harvest is always a time of dedication and teamwork at Nyetimber, but even more so in 2024”, says Owner and CEO, Eric Heerema. “We carefully select and press only the finest grapes, but in the challenging growing season of 2024, attention to detail was paramount for us to achieve our ambitious quality objectives.”

A warm, wet spring meant that, while Nyetimber’s vineyard teams escaped without too much frost bother, canopy management became crucial to protect against disease – chiefly, powdery mildew. There was also extensive weed control and under-vine maintenance to be done. Budburst took place at the expected point in time, yet flowering was protracted by particularly cool and damp conditions. Summer followed suit, with mild temperatures and only small breaks in the rain.

As a result, the grapes required especially stringent quality checks. As a producer, Nyetimber will accept smaller yields as the vintage dictates, prioritising quality well above quantity if there is any doubt. And so it was that certain grapes were indeed left on the vines this year, ensuring that only the finest fruit was taken. “We don't need to make more [wine] for the sake of it,” says Brand Ambassador Zoe Dearsley. “We focus on quality. Prime example: 2012, we didn't pick a single grape because it was a cold and wet vintage – it rained all summer and the grapes didn’t meet our quality standards. Eric decided that he would rather not harvest the grapes from that year, rather than go ahead and create a substandard wine.”

Only exceptional wines will do

This unwavering pursuit of perfection is what has helped turn Nyetimber into perhaps the most recognisable English wine brand there is over the past three decades. Bought by Dutch entrepreneur Eric in 2006, for whom it is now a family home as well as a vineyard, the Nyetimber estate can trace its roots back to the Domesday Book (its prestige cuvée is named ‘1086’ in honour of its mention).

The brand now boasts 11 vineyards across the counties of Kent, West Sussex and Hampshire in the south of England, with 30 full-time vineyard staff employed to look after them. These sites are not just owned outright but planted from scratch for full control – all in the name of quality, once again. Drones are used to colour-map the vines so that any intervention required can be precisely targeted, and great resource is put into ensuring soil health. Biodiversity is hugely important, with wildflowers and animals encouraged in the vineyards and many trees planted across the portfolio; in one location, in Amberley, West Sussex, a plot of around 300 hectares only has 22 hectares planted to vine with a substantial part of the remainder being rewilded.

Overall, Nyetimber now boasts 425 hectares of land, with 350 currently in production, as of the 2024 harvest. This year, just over 2,000 tonnes of grapes were hand-harvested from those by over 450 pickers across 16 days, from 4th to 19th October 2024.

Reflecting on 2024

“The season presented many challenges for us,” says Head Winemaker Cherie Spriggs, “and it has been an intense couple of weeks in the vineyard, the team working from sunrise to sunset, up to seven days a week, to harvest only the highest quality grapes to ensure the delicate, refined flavours we’re known for.

“In the winery each parcel will be vinified separately, aiming to capture the subtle nuance that the wines of 2024 seem to possess. However, as the weather of the 2024 summer was such an outlier for us (and England), we are pleased to have such a deep collection of reserve wines to ensure we can maintain consistency in our multi-vintage blends.”

After fermentations are complete, tastings of the base wines will begin in early January 2025, to decide the blends that the 2024 harvest will go into. And since vinification is done parcel-by-parcel, Cherie will have a vast artist’s palette to play with, thus enabling her to achieve the complexity and character for which the Nyetimber wines have become known.

In the vineyards, work is well underway to prepare for the next growing cycle – the vines will be pruned and the fields tidied before winter sets in.

Find out more about the Nyetimber wines here.