An exceptional vintage

Dorset’s Langham Wine Estate celebrates its 15th birthday with top awards, expanding acreage and a new wine in one remarkable year

This year is proving to be memorable for Dorsetbased Langham Wine Estate – Justin Langham and his team have just celebrated the 15th anniversary of the vineyard at Crawthorne Farm, near Dorchester, as well as an ice-bucket full of trophies for their sparkling wines from the Wine GB Awards and Decanter World Wine Awards (DWWA), where Langham wines won five gold medals, five silvers and a bronze.

For founder and managing director Justin, the anniversary is an important milestone. He told friends and guests at an anniversary celebration day: ‘I take immense pride in evolving what was once my father’s hobby into the thriving Langham Wine Estate we see today and I am truly delighted to see the estate reach this milestone.

‘After visiting many of the world’s most highly regarded wine regions and having studied viticulture at Plumpton College, I decided to make my dream a reality. We planted 30 acres of vineyard in 2009 and have since expanded to 85 acres. In May, we planted 13,000 new Chardonnay vines on the final 10 acres of our planned expansion and are anticipating bountiful harvests in the years to come.

‘Behind our success lies a dedicated team whose passion and expertise produce the exceptional wines within our portfolio. I am very proud of what we have achieved so far.’

Low intervention wines

The winery’s main production is sparkling wine. Still wine is only made in exceptional vintages, as 2022 undoubtedly was

The Langham winery team is led by Tommy Grimshaw, who became the UK’s youngest head winemaker when he was just 24 years old. Not your traditional winemaker, Tommy worked his way up from labelling wine when he left school after his first year of A Levels. Now 28, he is constantly discovering ways to be creative in his winemaking, and is particularly focused on a low intervention approach, which includes only using grapes grown on the estate and hand-harvesting the grapes. With a south-facing aspect, chalk soils and a unique microclimate, Crawthorne Vineyard provides a perfect terroir for ripening the classic champagne varieties – Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier. The winery’s exceptional wines are not only recognised in this country, but have won the biggest international awards, including the coveted Best Sparkling Wine Producer award at the International Wine and Spirit Competition (IWSC) in 2020. In addition to the successful core range of wines, including Corallian, Culver, Rosé and Blanc de Blancs, this anniversary year has seen Langham Wine Estate release a new still wine, the first since 2020. The 2022 Chardonnay is named after Search for Enlightenment, by sculptor Simon Gudgeon, who has the gallery and sculpture park, Sculpture by the Lakes, near Tincleton.

The winery’s main production is sparkling wine. Still wine is only made in exceptional vintages, as 2022 undoubtedly was. At harvest, winemaking team Tommy Grimshaw and Andy Wiles agreed that the quality of fruit was great enough to make a still chardonnay, separating a portion of ripe juice from the heavier ‘taille’ fraction of the pressing. Langham’s oxidative style, use of old oak and wild yeast fermentation, has formed a wine of elegance, expressive of the cool climate and pure chalk soils of this corner of Dorset. This 2022 Chardonnay is also the first wine from the estate to be bottled in reused glass bottles.

Representing the terroir

The WineGB Awards highlight the excellence of Britain’s wines and wine producers. The judging panel was this year headed by broadcaster and wine expert Oz Clarke and Masters of Wine Susie Barrie and Peter Richards.

Langham’s Corallian Classic Cuvée NV, Culver Classic Cuvée NV, Rosé NV, Blanc de Blancs NV and Pinot Noir 2019 all received gold medals and there was a silver medal for the new, limited edition, still

Chardonnay, Search for Enlightenment 2022. Tommy Grimshaw said: ‘We are absolutely thrilled to receive a personal best from the WineGB Awards with five gold medals. We are dedicated to producing exceptional sparkling wines that truly represent our terroir, using only grapes grown on our 85-acre Dorset vineyard. We believe this commitment is crucial as the English wine scene continues to expand rapidly.

‘Our mission with our traditional method sparkling range is to produce wines which can be enjoyed throughout a meal, not just as an aperitif.’

Now in its 21st year, the Decanter World Wine Awards (DWWA) is the world’s largest and most influential wine competition, renowned globally for the rigorous judging process and world-class judges. DWWA awarded silver medals to Langham’s Corallian Classic Cuvée NV, Culver Classic Cuvée NV, Blanc de Blancs NV and Pinot Noir 2019, and a bronze medal to the Rosé NV.

• langhamwine.co.uk

Langham wines are expressive of the cool climate and the (here visible) pure chalk soils of this corner of Dorset