10 award-winning English wines to drink during English Wine Week
A run of medals at the Global Wine Masters suggests the UK’s producers no longer need patriotic goodwill to fill glasses. Here are 10 bottles to seek out for English Wine Week.
There was a time when an English wine arrived in a small flotilla of patriotic feeling, the enthusiasm doing rather more work than the contents of the glass. That arrangement is now well and truly over.
The proof sits in the results of the 2025 and 2026 Global Wine Masters. The ten bottles below, six sparkling and four still, all carry a medal from those two years, and between them they explain why an English label can now be opened without a length of bunting to keep it company.
Sparkling
Traditional-method fizz remains the most persuasive thing England sends abroad and rewards cool conditions and the right soils. Two of the wines here took the competition’s top Master medal, and four more took Gold.
Silverhand Estate Blanc de Blancs 2018
Master, Global Sparkling Masters 2025
Silverhand’s 2018 Blanc de Blancs was one of England’s strongest showings at the 2025 Global Sparkling Masters, claiming the top Master medal in the £50 to £70 bracket. Made in Kent, it speaks for the polished, Chardonnay-led wing of English sparkling. The result places it among the most accomplished English wines judged across the two years.
Balfour Brut Rosé 2020
Master, Global Sparkling Masters 2026
A Master at the 2026 Global Sparkling Masters made this the highest-ranking English wine of the year. The Kent estate has treated rosé as a serious category for years.
Balfour Cuvée Owen Erland Elias 2020
Gold, Global Sparkling Masters 2026
A Gold added to Balfour’s considerable haul at the same 2026 competition. The cuvée sits at the more ambitious end of the range.
Louis Pommery England Blanc de Blancs 2020
Gold, Global Sparkling Masters 2026
Gold at the 2026 Global Sparkling Masters, following a Gold for the producer’s non-vintage English sparkling in 2025. Made in Hampshire, it marries English-grown Chardonnay to a Champagne house that knows a great deal about bubbles. The wine is one of the clearest cases of French expertise being adapted to English ground.
Roebuck Estates Rosé de Noirs 2020
Gold, Global Sparkling Masters 2026
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Gold at the 2026 Global Sparkling Masters, finishing ahead of the producer’s Silver-winning Classic Cuvée 2020 and Blanc de Noirs 2018. The Sussex house has built its name on vintage sparkling wine, and this is its darker-fruited reading of rosé. The name, too, is admirably plain, which counts for something in a category where wines occasionally seem christened after a minor character from a forgotten opera.
Sandridge Barton Classic Cuvée 2022
Gold, Global Sparkling Masters 2025
Gold in the white sparkling brut category at the 2025 Global Sparkling Masters. The Devon estate also took Gold for its Classic Cuvée Rosé from the same vintage, but the white earns the place here as the more representative bottle. Devon is hardly the first county that springs to mind when the talk turns to traditional-method sparkling, which is precisely what makes a result like this worth noticing.
Still wine
Ripening grapes far enough for table wine is a more exposed negotiation with the weather, and the weather has not always kept its side of it. Warmer recent vintages and steadier work in the vineyard have changed the terms, producing whites and reds with regional character as opposed to novelty value – the dial has shifted from, “look, we can grow Chardonnay”, to, “Look, we can grow good Chardonnay, the sort you might actually like to drink”.
Balfour Luke’s Pinot Noir 2024
Gold, Global Pinot Noir Masters 2026
Gold at the 2026 Global Pinot Noir Masters, in the £30 to £50 oaked still red category. The competition’s judges called England, and Kent in particular, one of the surprises of the year, with Balfour turning out fine, fresh Pinot Noir. Freshness was rarely the problem for England – pairing it with ripe fruit and a convincing texture is the harder trick, and the one this wine pulls off.
Balfour Signature Pinot Noir 2022
Gold, Global Pinot Noir Masters 2026
A second Gold at the 2026 Global Pinot Noir Masters, giving the estate two of the leading English results in the category. The 2022 vintage handed growers warmer conditions than England has historically enjoyed. More evidence that Kent is building a credible identity for serious still red.
Chapel Down Bacchus 2024
Gold, Global Travel Retail Masters 2025
Ah, the dreaded ‘marmite’ grape. Gold at the 2025 Global Travel Retail Masters, in the £15 to £20 unoaked white category. The judges described a lovely expression of Bacchus, all grassy, nettle and greengage character. Bacchus is still England’s most recognisable still white, an aromatic lift carried on the kind of briskness that suits seafood or goat’s cheese.
Balfour Nannette’s Rosé 2025
Silver, Global Rosé Masters 2026
Silver at the 2026 Global Rosé Masters, in the £20 to £30 unoaked dry rosé category. It was one of only a handful of British still rosés to take a medal, proof that pale pink wine need not travel up from Provence with a seven-figure lifestyle campaign and an unnecessarily large hat. It rounds off a selection that shows the breadth now coming out of English vineyards.
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The medal-winning wines from The Global Rosé Masters 2026
