The fun thing (among many) about the work we do, is that wine can act as a sort of time capsule - so it's a real treat to release a special wine produced as an impromptu collaboration between three friends: our Al, alongside Nicola & Daniel Ham in the 2023 vintage.

DNA V1 is a col-fondo style sparkling produced from Herefordshire fruit. Nicola, Dan and Al decided to make a wine together over dinner table conversations at their Wiltshire winery ahead of the vintage, but sourcing fruit in the challenging conditions of 2023 was proving tricky. On the winds, they heard of a grower spraying no herbicides or pesticides in Herefordshire with fruit to spare, so Al and our pal Ryan took off in a hired Luton box van to collect the grapes.

Several hours and one wing mirror later, they returned to Nic & Dan's winery to begin processing the fruit.

The winemaking was undertaken without a plan, preferring to work intuitively to help the fruit express itself in the most fun way possible, responding to the process and how the varieties reacted - pushing it in interesting directions to see what might happen.

Comprising 53% Huxelrebe, 33% Reichensteiner, 8% Schönberger and 6% Bacchus - Reichensteiner and Bacchus were whole-bunch foot-stomped and macerated for eight days before being pressed. The remainder of the fruit was destemmed and macerated together for 10 days, with Al sinking to his waist foot-stomping the Huxelrebe. Everything was assembled together, and raised in Burgundy barrels. For V1, they selected a few barrels that had begun to develop a flor and bottled them with 2024 Chardonnay juice - courtesy of Lucie & Jules at Ham Street - to spark secondary fermentation.

All movements by gravity, the wine has seen no fining, filtration or additions. Label by our friend Sam Leedham!