12/09/2026
Our Foundations -The Slope
Most cultures have a foundation myth, often sanctified in religious rites that bind people together providing enduring inspiration to following generations. So too with companies, most famously Hewlitt Packard started by Bill Hewlitt and Dave Packard in 1939 in a garage at 367 Addison Avenue, Palo Alto, California. It is now on the tourist circuit and credited as the birthplace of Silicon Valley. Alan visited in the early 1990’s in his professional life as the director of research at ICI’s Colour Division in Manchester, leading a project to develop the black colour used in the HP ink cartridge. How many people know that colour was created at ICI’s laboratory in Blackley,Manchester? 😀
On a somewhat lesser scale, the origin of Helme Edge Vineyard lies on the slope at the bottom of the garden below the house. Planted originally with gorse, invading nettles resulted in its replacement with vines in 2017 when Tom was still at school. We planted 75 Solaris and 25 Phoenix varieties, both PIWI fungus resistant hybrid vines suitable for our Yorkshire climate. We made some excellent w**e in 2019 from the first Solaris bunches. This encouraged our hobby to begin to slip out of control with the planting of a further 300 Solaris vines in 2020 during Lockdown, setting us on the path to the business we have today!
From the 2026 harvest, we plan to make a reserve cuvée of Solaris from this special slope within our vineyard. We currently have a net in place to protect the vines from sugar hungry blackbirds🐦⬛ ahead of our harvest next week! 😀
