Kidmore Organic Vineyard - English Sparkling Wine on a Historic Oxfordshire Estate
Set in the rolling countryside of south Oxfordshire, Kidmore Organic Vineyard is a young, family-run English sparkling wine estate with deep historical roots. The vineyard lies on the grounds of Kidmore House in the hamlet of Kidmore End, just outside Reading, where vines were first planted in May 2018 on one hectare of organic land. The estate's story, however, stretches back nearly nine centuries, and the layers of heritage are what make this small project such a fascinating newcomer on the English wine scene.
A Historic Estate Reaches for the Sky
The land on which Kidmore Vineyard now grows its Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier was first recorded in the charge of Walter Giffard, Earl of Buckingham, in 1158. He granted the estate to Augustinian friars, who held it through the medieval period until Henry VIII's Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1536, when the Crown sold off the property. The present-day Kidmore House was built around 1680 and is listed by English Heritage as Grade II*, a designation reserved for buildings of particular architectural or historic interest.
The estate subsequently passed through a series of notable families. After the Ogilvies, ownership moved to Major Huguenot Waterhouse and his wife Lady Caroline Waterhouse, a daughter of John Spencer Churchill, the 10th Duke of Marlborough. Their famous guests included Sir Winston Churchill and Lady Churchill, who were apparently regular visitors to the house, with Winston's last recorded visit coming in 1957.
The Kendall Family and a New Chapter
The Kendall family moved to Kidmore House in August 2002 and have raised four children on the estate: Cathryn, Hugo, Marcus and Luc. Niamh Kendall is a horticulturalist who has spent her working life in horticulture, growing and selling cut flowers from the estate's cutting garden. With that depth of plant knowledge, planting a vineyard on the warmest, most free-draining slopes of the property was, as the family puts it, a logical next step.
The first vines went into the ground in May 2018, on a single hectare. From the outset the project was conceived as an organic venture, and the Kendall family have stuck to that philosophy through every season, including the difficult ones.
A Partnership with Harrow & Hope
Almost as soon as the vineyard was planted, the Kendalls secured a partnership that immediately signalled their ambitions. Henry Laithwaite of the respected Harrow & Hope winery agreed to make their sparkling wine. Having tasted Laithwaite's wines, the family were delighted to secure the collaboration, and it places Kidmore's small first releases in a highly credible cellar.
Sparkling wine is a long game in any climate, but especially in England. After planting in 2018, the earliest realistic bottle release sits several years into the future, and the family's plan is to bottle in spring 2023 after the 2022 harvest, then allow the traditional-method sparkling to mature on lees until it is judged ready.
The Harvests
The vineyard publishes detailed harvest notes for each vintage, giving a transparent picture of what organic viticulture on this Oxfordshire site actually looks like in practice. The story of three harvests tells you almost everything you need to know about English weather, English patience, and the small but rising quality bar of English sparkling.
2022 - A Benchmark Season
The 2022 season began with pruning in February and tying down in March. Spring was relatively frost-free, so little damage occurred at bud burst. Flowering in June was very good, and the summer that followed was one of the hottest on record, with 42°C recorded. While heat is welcome, some rain is also welcome, and none came. The drought kept yields low across all varieties on four-year-old vines, but quality began to look exceptional. Rain finally arrived just in time. The reds were harvested in early September, the whites in mid September, with good sugar levels, good acids and high quality juice, which the family describe as a very exciting first harvest for Kidmore.
2023 - Rescued by September
2023 brought only a few spring frosts, then perfect warm weather for June flowering, followed by a genuinely wet and cold July and August. September was the saviour: one of the hottest months on record rescued the harvest, although sugar levels remained slightly low. Disease pressure was higher than in previous years thanks to the damp weather, with Botrytis the main concern. The wider English vineyard industry benefited from unusually large yields, bigger even than 2018, and Kidmore responded by green harvesting around a third of their bunches to give the remaining fruit a better chance of quality. They still pulled in around 8 tonnes per hectare, harvesting later than usual between the 9th and 16th of October.
2024 - Patience Rewarded
The 2024 growing season in the UK was, in the vineyard's own words, undoubtedly challenging. Persistent wet conditions continued right through to harvest, adversely affecting flowering. A timely warm spell at the end of June helped, although the total effective growing days remained significantly below average. Increased disease pressure and a notable rise in bird damage, more pronounced than in any previous year, combined with the family's rigorous focus on quality to push yields around 40% below normal. The elevated acidity levels, ideal for sparkling base wines, are intended to benefit from malolactic fermentation to round out the finish. Harvest came on 23rd October, and despite the tougher conditions, there is, in the family's words, a palpable sense of anticipation for the evolving character of the wines.
Organic Viticulture, English Sparkling
From the beginning the vineyard has been run as an organic programme. The early vintages have already tested that approach: a late frost in May 2020, one of the latest frosts the south of England has encountered, affected growth in 2020 and 2021, prompting the family in their third year to focus on the vines rather than the fruit. The 2022 drought year, the wet 2023 and the difficult 2024 have each demanded different responses, from green harvesting to careful canopy management and selective picking.
For a sparkling-focused estate, these are exactly the kind of vintage contrasts that matter. High natural acidity and clean fruit are the foundation of a traditional-method sparkling, and Kidmore's cool, well-drained Oxfordshire slopes, combined with their organic regime, are deliberately set up to deliver them.
Visiting Kidmore Vineyard
Kidmore is a small, private estate rather than a large visitor centre, and the focus to date has rightly been on getting the vineyard and the wines right. The estate does, however, open its garden and vineyard under the National Garden Scheme, which arranges occasional open days in aid of charity; the National Garden Scheme page for Kidmore House garden and vineyard carries full details of upcoming openings. For visitors, those open days offer a rare chance to walk the vines, see the cutting garden and experience the setting that has hosted everyone from Augustinian friars to Winston Churchill.
A Kidmore Vineyard gallery showcases photography from the estate, from spring blossoms to the bright autumn canopy and the working vineyard rows, while seasonal updates are regularly posted to the vineyard's Instagram account.
How to Find Kidmore Vineyard
The vineyard sits at the heart of the Kidmore End hamlet, a short drive from Reading and within easy reach of Henley-on-Thames, Sonning Common and the wider south Oxfordshire countryside. The postcode for sat-navs is RG4 9AR.
- Address: Kidmore Vineyard, Kidmore House, Kidmore End, Oxfordshire, RG4 9AR
- Email: Stephen@kidmorevineyard.com
- Telephone: +44 (0)7818 011 690
- Website: kidmorevineyard.com
- Instagram: @kidmore_vineyard
With a first commercial release drawn from the 2022 vintage, Kidmore Organic Vineyard takes its place on the English sparkling wine map.