Unless you’re lucky enough to live on a fashionable stretch of England’s south coast, then there’s a fair chance that you won’t have heard of Brighton-based winemaker Tamasine Herriott or the incredible wines she makes in her space at Freedom of the Press winery. Total production is just a few thousand bottles. 

These wines, bottled under her Vindemiate label, present a fascinating – and delicious – paradox. They are at once super-traditional and ultra-modern. Vindemiate itself comes from an old Anglo-Saxon English term for winemaking. The project’s first two wines – an orange wine and a pet-nat – are made using some of the most long-established winemaking techniques, which far predate the traditional method for making sparkling wine. Yet they have so far found their market principally amongst the more youthful, forward-looking, and experimental wine bars near Tam’s home in Brighton.  

Don’t make the mistake of assuming that these are hipster wines suitable only for those who prefer ‘wine adjacent’ concoctions. Tam uses her decidedly classical winemaking training to make pinpoint fresh, clean, fruit-driven wines that would appeal to even the most traditional palates. 

So, with this fascinating contrast of the traditional and modern in mind, let’s take a journey back in time to discover a winemaking story that would make Doc Brown proud. 

If you’re gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style? 

Like all great Marty McFly-style heroes, Tam wasn’t looking for an adventure. 

In fact, working for a firm of accountants doing trial balances and submitting VAT returns, you might say that her working life was as far away from being adventurous as it is possible to be. “I like things to be ordered and I’m quite organised,” she tells me. 

Yet a point came when she realised that accountancy was, in essence, “reorganising other people’s chaos year after year.” 

Tam continues, “I released that the only reason I was doing it was because it paid quite well, and I needed either to bite the bullet, accept that this was going to be my life and my career and do my accountancy exams, or do something different. 

“Then, one evening in the pub, a friend suggested studying winemaking at Plumpton and I was like, ‘is that even a proper career?’ Eight years ago, English wine was still very niche.” 

Nevertheless, adventure had come calling, and Tamasine was ready to jump into the DeLorean. Yet it’s one thing to study for a degree in viticulture and oenology at Plumpton – another to begin making wine for yourself. Most graduates aren’t lucky enough to have the means to own their own vineyard and winery, so they typically end up finding employment in other peoples’ cellars. 

This was the route Tam expected to go – and she was lucky enough to land a prime work placement at Freedom of the Press winery in Oxfordshire. This is a fantastic startup ‘urban’ winery that buys in fruit from specialist grape growers and then makes wine under its own label. 

She got on famously with Freedom of the Press’ owner Gavin Carver – who describes her as someone he ‘can’t live without’. In order to keep Tam involved at the end of her placement period, Gavin offered her use of some of his cellar capacity – and Vindemiate was born. 

This new label followed the urban winery tried and trusted recipe of looking to buy the best quality fruit, from the best specialist grape growers. Yet where Freedom of the Press looked to make classically-styled English still wines from noble varieties like Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Gris, Vindemiate turned towards England’s often overlooked hybrids.