What a summer it's going to be...

Mark Driver - Owner

Come on, we’re due a good summer, it might cheer us up after all the doom and gloom of the BREXIT talk.  So far we have had a spectacular start to the year.

As you will read from Cameron the Vineyard is about 4-5 days ahead of where we were last year.  June was actually warmer than normal and last year.  We’ve had perfect growing weather, sun then rain then sun again, flowering is well under way and benefiting from the warm dry weather. 

Jonathan and Will have just bottled our 2015 sparkling wine and are preparing the Winery for this year’s harvest.  We have a new 8 tonne Coquard press arriving in September and Jonathan has recently been to Epernay looking at bottling and disgorging equipment. 

We are starting to plan ahead for Harvest 2016 and recruiting pickers. You can stay at the Flint Barns - why not make it a working holiday? If you’re interested please read on and contact Cameron. 

If you want to see what I mean, the Flint Barns are a perfect place to stay when exploring the South Downs and we have great family rooms.

I hope you enjoy this newsletter, remember following us on Twitter and subcribe to the Blogs will keep you up to date with what we are doing at Rathfinny.

Here's to a long, lovely English summer! 

Great Growth

Cameron Roucher - Vineyard Manager

By the time this newsletter goes out flowering in the vineyard should be finished, It’s a relief to have it finally complete as we can now see just how much fruit we will have this year for certain.

This year has been a great year for growth; even those areas of the vineyard, which have in the past struggled to get going, have done well.  It’s often hard early in the season to anticipate the yield for the year, particularly on a young vineyard with no historic data so we do bud counts at pruning, shoot counts early in the season, and inflorescence counts once the flowers are visible but its not until the vine has actually set its fruit for the year that we can get a true idea of that year's crop.

As a result of all this growth we’ve got a large crew of local people working for us this summer, keeping the vineyard tidy with shoot thinning, lifting wires and tucking in. 

We’re going to need an even larger crew for harvest this year, given that we have more than doubled our crop compared to last year. It’ll involve lots of walking, with plenty of manual labour but we try and make it as fun as possible, so if anyone is interested - get in touch.

More wine in the cellar

Jonathan Médard - Winemaker

We are thrilled now that we have even more sparkling wine ageing in the cellar.

At the end of June, we bottled around 5,100 bottles of a 2015 Rosé (blend of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay) that we expect to release along with the 2014 Blanc de Blanc (which was 100% Chardonnay) in 2018. That will be 3 years ageing on lees for the Blanc de Blanc and 2 years for the Rosé.

We also bottled around 15,100 bottles of a 2015 Blanc de Noirs (blend of Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier mainly) to be released in 2019 after 3 years of ageing on lees.

In May, we bottled about 3,100 bottles of 2015 Cradle Valley, which is a still wine that we called “Hobbs Hawth”. It is a blend of Pinot Gris and Pinot Blanc for the most part. This wine, released on July 4th, is very expressive with fruity and flowery aromas, balanced with a great acidity.

We have also been working on the on-going project that is the expansion of the Winery with the addition of Phase 2 (Bottling, Labelling, Riddling, Disgorging) and Phase 3 (Storage for wines on lees). With the relief of the planning application being accepted, we’ve been working on the layout and the phasing of equipment procurement throughout the coming years. 

Down Under

Will Steedman - Assistant Winemaker

After graduating from Plumpton college I joined Rathfinny full time. Having gained a qualification I was keen to continue to learn and gain valuable experience. The annual nature of the grape harvest means that it can take some years to gain the practical skills and understanding I desire. What most aspiring winemakers do is travel to the opposite hemisphere to work during their harvest period thus reducing the time needed to become competent and confident.

Therefore in January this year I traveled to Australia, specifically to the world famous Barossa Valley in South Australia to take up the position of night shift white winemaker at Yalumba Family Vignerons.

Yalumba is a 140 year old wine business with vines dating back to 1880's (some of the oldest in the world) which is very different in that respect to Rathfinny. Another difference is the scale of the operation, during the 2016 vintage (or harvest period) we crushed 12,500 tonnes of fruit compared to 30 tonnes at Rathfinny in 2015. Obviously this volume will grow as our Vineyard matures but not to the same scale. 

The main similarities between the two wine producers are that they are both owned by the same founding families which ensures both have the same unwavering commitment to quality. 

In my role I was responsible for processing the 8,500 tonnes of fruit destined to become white, rose and sparkling wine. This involved overseeing and ensuring the quality of all crushing, pressing, additions and monitoring the fermentation's. Yalumba produce four different sparkling wine labels which were of particular interest to me to able to learn first hand how they craft thier wines.  

Now I'm back at work here on the beautiful Rathfinny Estate just in time for stabilising, blending, filtering and bottling our fantastic 2015 wines. 

Tours, festivals and retreats

Georgia Mallinson - Head of Business Development

Events at Rathfinny are continuing apace as we move into our summer season.

Tours are selling exceptionally well and therefore we have added in some extra dates to meet demand.  If you are lucky enough to be in possession of a gift voucher for one of our tours I would suggest you book a place on one of the remaining tours for this season as soon as you can.

We had the pleasure to co-sponsor the inaugural Alfest alongside The Star Inn, Alfriston and Long Man Brewery, Litlington  on the 9th July. Our aim was to introduce a family friendly, relaxed festival into the Alfriston calendar. Our intention was to raise money for the St Andrew’s Church restoration fund whilst showcasing the best the South Downs has to offer in terms of food, drink and music. Based on the fantastic feedback we have had and the amazing £1750 we raised for the church we achieved our objectives and more. A huge thank you must go out to the stall-holders, musicians and customers who gave us so much support by attending an unknown festival. Watch this space for news about next year!

We have a new collaboration with Words Away. Their aim is to bring together writers in a creative environment to explore the writing process. They hold monthly salons at the Tea House Theatre Café in Vauxhall, London and are hosting their first creative writing retreat with us at Rathfinny Wine Estate. The retreat is being held at the Flint Barns 7th-9th October 2016.

“However much you love writing, and whatever your goals are, it can be so hard to clear the time, not to mention the mental and physical space, to get down to it. Words Away at Rathfinny offers you the chance to write in peace and to explore and develop your skills, in a supportive group of like-minded people.” Kellie Jackson -Words Away

For more information or to book a place on the retreat please see Words Away website 

Finally, and probably most importantly, we have a new member of the team. A big welcome to Millie who is our new Business Development Assistant.  Millie will be working with me across all the customer experience aspects of the Estate. From my point of view it’s a huge bonus to have help!

Millie studied Film & Television at the London College of Communication. She has always been interested in joining the family business since her parents, Mark and Sarah, bought the land in 2010.

After University, she worked for a London based Innovation Consultancy, Fearlessly Frank, who specialized in brand strategy. Following this she worked for Partizan, a global production company but she felt 2016 was an exciting time to join Rathfinny. Welcome Millie!

Celebrating the vine in various ways...

Alison Cowley - Gun Room Manager

The health benefits of a daily glass of red have been well publicised, but are you aware that the vine also provides unrivalled beauty benefits too?

The French beauty company Caudalie, based at Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte near Bordeaux, was born after a dermatologist remarked, on seeing what was discarded in the winemaking process: ‘You are throwing away riches’. He was referring to the unique properties found in vines which are so beneficial to our skin. 

We are pleased, uniquely for a UK vineyard, to stock this premium beauty product in the Gun Room.  

In June we held a Vineyard Beauty Event in the Flint Barns. Richard took our guests on a short walk around the Vineyard where he explained the origins of the three key ingredients in the Caudalie range which come from the vine fruit, stalk and sap.

Nicolle Egan led a fabulous beauty workshop where our guests tried any products they wished, gained invaluable beauty advice, and left with an individual, tailor-made prescription. Guests were able to purchase products at a specially discounted price. 

And to crown it all, Chef Mark produced a splendid lunch. The desert comprised jelly made with elderflower and our own Cradle Valley wine, with suspended grapes, topped with elderflowers and grape leaves – just amazing!

The Vineyard was the inspiration for the day, and it’s fair to say that our guests were pretty inspired too!  ‘Extremely enjoyable, informative, relaxing!’ wrote one. 

We are busy planning our next Beauty Event; if you would like to be informed about this, please register your interest below. 

On July 4th we released our second still wine, ‘Hobbs Hawth’.This is another easy drinking white wine which can be drunk as an aperitif or perfectly accompanies spicy foods, seafood and asparagus tart.  

We invited Jonathan Médard down to the Gun Room for a special ‘Meet the Winemaker’ event. This was a joyful affair, made slightly surreal by a Frenchman extolling the virtues of English wine. That day we had visitors from far and wide; it was a good opportunity to share with a number of nationalities the great story of English wine. 

As we await the release of our first Sparkling in 2018, we are pleased to already be producing wine that has met with favourable comments.

Jonathan had such a good time that he’s agreed to do some more ‘Meet the Winemaker’ sessions. To find out when the next one is please register your interest below. 

We hope to see you soon!

attracting the best

Richard James - Operations and Environment Manager

Our research into using biological control within our vines has been mentioned before in our Newsletter and via our social media.  This Phd project has finally gathered some pace with the individual rows of flower mixtures having been sown between some of our vines and the collection of bees and wasps commenced.

Working with Sussex University we will be making regular monitoring visits to these rows to ascertain which ones are the best at attracting the insects we need to ‘control’ the insects we do not want.  On my last walk through with net in hand last week that amounted to over 700 bees and wasps!

Our permissive footpath the Rathfinny Trail, is having a mini makeover shortly.  The Trail joins together a series of rights of ways (one footpath and three bridleways) and then circumnavigates a portion of the Vineyard adjacent to the Flint Barns.  I regularly update the Estate Sightings of our website with snippets on what can be seen, heard or even smelt on the Trail!  To enhance the experience of the walker further we are installing three information boards on the Trail this week.  These provide a map of the route and Estate and also have a section which can be updated regularly with information on what wildlife can be seen and what work is currently been done in the Vineyard.

In addition to this we will also be installing a ‘talking post’ on the Trail at the bottom of the slope below the Flint Barns.  By pressing the buttons on the oak post the walker will be able to listen to Cameron and myself briefly talk about the vines and the wildlife respectively.  We hope the ‘talking posts’ will provide added detail for those walkers that wish to seek it, and we would really welcome your thoughts on these posts or anything else you would wish to see on the Trail.

last and maybe least!

Ade Lamb - Flint Barns Manager

We are having an exceptionally busy summer at the Flint Barns – hence the short but sweet article!

Sunday Roasts are proving to be incredibly popular and we have some dates for August, September and October. 

We are also going to be opening the Flint Barn doors for some evening meals and, dare we say, Christmas lunches and dinners.

Remember the Flint Barns are available for exclusive use for parties and celebrations. Bookings for 2017/18 are already coming in so don't leave it too late!

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