We’re excited to have begun picking a small amount of grapes for our 2026 harvest this week, slightly earlier than expected, as some of our vines had already reached the perfect level of ripeness.
The harvest will get fully underway from 21st September, when we expect to pick around 425 of our 430 hectares across West Sussex, Hampshire and Kent. Almost 500 pickers will travel to our vineyards, carefully hand-picking up to 170 tonnes of grapes each day, parcel by parcel. This should yield almost 2,500 tonnes of grapes, potentially producing more than 1.5 million bottles of English Sparkling Wine.
This will be our earliest-ever harvest and the early start is down to record-breaking English summer temperatures, which have accelerated ripening. The warm weather has also helped vines affected by late-spring frosts to catch up.
Given the recent conditions, our winemaking team believes 2026 could be a vintage year, potentially allowing us to produce some or even all of our vintage-dated wines: Blanc de Blancs, Tillington Single Vineyard, 1086 by Nyetimber and 1086 by Nyetimber Rosé.
‘This year brings another unprecedented vintage as we begin harvesting earlier than ever. We are excited to taste the fruits of our labour, which, as always, has come with certain challenges: late spring frosts that affected almost 30% and the summer drought, which has decreased the size of certain berries. However, the hot and sunny weather has helped to balance out these factors, giving us strong potential for fantastic wine quality,’ says Head Winemaker Cherie Spriggs.
‘This is my 20th year of owning Nyetimber, and as ever the growing season has offered many ups and downs. At Nyetimber we own 100% of our vineyards, meaning that we have complete control when faced with viticultural obstacles such as frosts and drought. Our vineyard team has done a fantastic job protecting our vines throughout the seasons, and now that we enter our earliest ever harvest, our winemakers will begin to get a picture of what this year’s fruit could bring. We are expecting great quality from the 2026 vintage, which could lead to more award-winning wines in the years to come,’ says CEO and Owner Eric Heerema.
