This is the latest English sparkling wine entering the market this year

A winery in Hampshire is the latest to launch its own terroir-focused sparkler ahead of English Wine Week this spring.

Jacob Leadley, Black Chalk’s founder (Photo: Black Chalk).

Black Chalk, which takes its name from the material used by the old masters to sketch initial ideas onto canvas before finalising their masterpiece, will be available in two expressions next month; a classic brut and Black Chalk Wild Rose, both made from a blend of Chardonnay, Pinot Meunier and Pinot Noir.

The wines will have an RRSP of £35 for the Classic and £40 for the Wild Rose, and will initially be targeted at independent merchants and fine dining restaurants.

Jacob Leadley, Black Chalk’s founder and lead winemaker at Hampshire-based Hattingley Valley, gave up a job in The City to retrain as a winemaker back in 2009.

After completing a BSc in Viticulture and Oenology at Plumpton College, followed by stints in Central Otago and Champagne, he decided to embark on his own venture in 2015.

“Black Chalk has been nine years in the making; the journey has taken me and my family across the globe but has always been focused on England.”

“My aim has been to create wines which really typify Hampshire’s chalklands, a terroir that is becoming synonymous with pure fruit expression.”

Specialist distributor Red Squirrel, has been appointed UK agent and will focus on gaining distribution in restaurants and independent retailers across the UK.

The wines have an unusually high proportion of Pinot Meunier (34% in the Classic and 47% in the Wild Rose) – an as yet ‘under-rated variety in English winemaking’, and a variety which Leadley said is “ideally suited to Hampshire’s chalklands.”

The news comes as a crop of new vintages and wineries have begun to enter the UK market over the past decade.

There was a 64% rise in English and Welsh wines available in both the on and off-trade last year, compared with the 2.36 million bottles released in 2016, according to figures from HMRC, leading many to try new approaches to branding in an increasingly competitive market.

This week English winery Herbert Hall announced it will switch to an ‘en primeur’ system later this year, offering most of its cuvées on allocation.

And last October, the former chief executive of Gusbourne in Kent announced he is working on his own biodynamic project in Sussex that includes natural wines aged in Georgian qvevri.

English wine week is set to take place between 29 May and 1 June this year.