Gusbourne Estate: Prestige Traditional Method Cuvées Outside of Conventional Geographical Boundaries

In April 2023, I traveled to London for my Wine & Spirit Education Trust (WSET) graduation ceremony, and one of the first things I did after I bought my flight to London was to book a visit to an English sparkling winery!

Several English sparkling wineries are accessible from London, and as I only had one free day to visit a winery, I chose to book the Estate Tour at one of the most prestigious English sparkling wineries, Gusbourne Estate in Kent.

Getting to Gusbourne Estate from London

Depending on your starting point in London, Gusbourne Estate is located approximately 45 minutes to one hour via train to Ashford International Station and then a 15 minute taxi ride from Ashford International Station to the winery. Gusbourne highly recommends (and I fully agree as well) that visitors book their taxi reservations both to the winery and back to the train station before their visit, and the Gusbourne website provides phone numbers to call to make taxi appointments. Overall, I thought it was quite easy to get to and from the winery from London.

My Estate Tour cost £100 to book and began at 11 A.M. at the Kent winery with a welcome glass of the 2019 Gusbourne Brut Reserve, followed by a tour through the Kent vineyards (which included a glass of their Wild Ferment Chardonnay!) and the winery facilities and ending with a three-course lunch with a range of comparative wine pairings. The lunch was delicious, and we each had seven or more wines to taste, so I would say that my £100 was well spent!

Although the Gusbourne website estimates that the Estate Tour runs for four hours, I would recommend adding 30-45 minutes so that you are not rushed out of your visit, as our tour group had such a good time that we certainly went over the four hour estimate!

A Short History of Gusbourne Estate

The name “Gusbourne” refers back to the records of the year 1410 during the time that a man named John de Goosebourne owned the land on which the Kent vineyard is situated today. de Goosebourne’s family crest had three geese in it, and as a result, the current logo for Gusbourne features a goose with three pips.

Gusbourne’s founder, Andrew Weeber, an orthopedic surgeon from Stellenbosch in South Africa, had a taste for fine wine, including Champagne, and he was originally posted to the United Kingdom near Yorkshire. When his daughter also relocated to the United Kingdom and rented a home in the location of the current Gusbourne Estate in Kent, Weeber realized that the climate in Kent was much warmer and more suitable for viticulture than in Yorkshire, and he purchased the Gusbourne land in Kent to start a winery.

The first vines in Kent were planted in 2004, and eventually the estate added vineyards in West Sussex and built its winery in Kent, the location of its current tasting room.

The Terroir of Gusbourne Estate

Today, Gusbourne Estate has vineyards located in Kent and West Sussex, with approximately one-third of the grapes coming from West Sussex.

The West Sussex and Kent vineyards are both similarly situated from the English coast, but the West Sussex vineyard has a slightly higher elevation.

The Gusbourne vineyards are located at approximately 51 degrees North in latitude, which is outside of the conventional boundaries of quality viticulture of the band between 30 and 50 degrees latitude. While the climate of English vineyards used to be considered too marginal to be able to grow grapes for quality winemaking, with global warming raising temperatures, this view has been changing, and many people, including prominent brands in Champagne, are starting to view the English vineyard land as high quality terroir ideal for producing grapes that retain the high acidity desirable in sparkling wine while achieving suitable ripeness for flavor. Gusbourne named its prestige cuvée “Fifty One Degrees North” as a nod to the fact that Gusbourne is pushing the boundaries of conventional geographical boundaries in winemaking.

Kent is a predominantly clay-based vineyard area, while West Sussex has more chalk and flint. It is a common perception that world-class sparkling wines are grown from vineyards with chalk or limestone, and not clay, but according to our excellent guide Anna Midcalf DipWSET, the clay in Kent takes in warmth and releases it back into the vineyard to aid the ripening of the grapes, and the winery will also blend wines from both Kent and West Sussex to achieve the desired balance and features of the final wine. Simply from the fact that Gusbourne Estate is the most awarded English sparkling winery, the clay soil in Kent does not appear to detract from the production of high quality sparkling wines!

The weather was rainy the day before our visit, and clay turns into sticky mud, so Gusbourne Estate graciously provided our tour group with welllies to protect our clothes while we tromped through the muddy vineyards. I can personally attest to the fact that there is a significant amount of clay in Kent!

Viticultural Practices at Gusbourne Estate

Some geeky technical facts about viticulture at Gusbourne:

1. The rows are planted 2.5 meters apart, with all of the vines facing south to capture the morning sun.

2. Rows are planted according to clones and rootstocks. At Gusbourne, there are over 30 clones of Pinot Noir, with the intent to blend different expressions of Pinot Noir to add complexity to the resulting wines. The predominant rootstock appeared to be SO4, and Gusbourne uses mostly Burgundy and Champagne clones.

3. Gusbourne only produces Champagne grapes, with the current distribution at 60% Chardonnay, 30% Pinot Noir and 10% Meunier.

4. The vines are trained using single guyot with Pendelbogen. Guyot is the method of training a one-year old cane along a wire, and Pendelbogen modifies this training by hooking the one-year old cane over the wire and tying it down vertically as an arch. The Pendelbogen method helps the grapes benefit from the heat lower to the ground and spreads the surface area of the fruiting zone vertically due to the arch.

5. Sustainability is a key mission of Gusbourne, and it was a founding member of Sustainable Wines of Great Britain (SWGB). As of the date of this blog post, only 14 commercial vineyards or wineries carry the SWGB designation out of more than 500 commercial vineyards and 160 wineries in England and Wales. As an example, one of the sustainability initiatives used at Gusbourne is its regenerative fertilization program. Gusbourne composts old vines and chicken manure and applies the mixture to the vines on a three-year cycle.

6. Gusbourne produces wines from estate fruit only, and it does not buy grapes, nor does it sell grapes from its vineyards.

More Than Bubbles at Gusbourne Estate

Gusbourne produces a range of English sparkling wines, including Blanc de Blanc, Blanc de Noir, Rosé, Brut Reserve, Cork Aged, Late Disgorged and its prestige wine, Fifty One Degrees North. Gusbourne only makes vintage wines (as opposed to “NV” non-vintage wines), and all sparkling wines are labeled Brut. The first vintage of Fifty One Degrees North was 2014, and the wine is only made during exceptional years, with a minimum of six years ageing on the lees.

Although known best for the sparkling wines, Gusbourne also makes still wines, including its English Rosé, Chardonnay Guinevere, its extremely limited production of the Wild Ferment Chardonnay (only two barrels produced for the vintage 2021) and its dessert wine made from Chardonnay Clone 809. Clone 809 has an astonishingly close resemblance to the Muscat varieties with its floral, peach and grapey notes and moderate acidity, and the pairing with a light cream and fruit parfait at the end of our lunch displayed how much clonal selection matters in wine production.

Final Thoughts on My Gusbourne Estate Tour

I am usually ambivalent about scores and awards when it comes to wine, and if the fact that Gusbourne is the most awarded English sparkling winery does not convince you to book a visit when you are in London, I wanted to end this post by saying that my Estate Tour was one of the most complete and informative wine tours I have had while traveling.

Our guide, Anna Midcalf DipWSET, had just graduated from the WSET program the year before in 2022 and has a substantial and deep understanding of viticultural and winemaking practices. Our tour group was nerding out with all kinds of technical and business questions during our tour, and Anna delivered all of the information clearly and in an accessible manner for all levels of the wine lovers in our group. I would highly recommend the tour for any WSET Diploma student about to take on the D4 Sparkling Wines unit to get an upfront look at traditional-method sparkling wine production in England.

In addition, in our eight-person tour group, we had among us two International Wine Challenge judges who were going to be scoring wines blind the next day and two DipWSETs about to walk the graduation ceremony two days later. During the graduation festivities in London, I also met two other DipWSETs who were also visiting Gusbourne during their trip to London. Aside from the excellent food, wine and learning, a visit to Gusbourne was clearly a great way to meet other wine lovers and to geek out over some fantastic English sparkling wine together.

Cheers!