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Each quarter of an hour or so, an ageing diesel train arrives at a graffiti-covered station. Nearby, a police siren pierces the almost continuous road noise. Daily travelers rush by falling apart, ivy-draped fencing panels as rain clouds gather.

It is maybe the last place you expect to find a perfectly formed vineyard. However James Bayliss-Smith has managed to 40 mature vines heavy with round purplish berries on a rambling garden plot situated between a row of 1930s houses and a local rail line just above the city downtown.

"I've noticed individuals concealing illegal substances or other items in those bushes," says the grower. "But you just get on with it ... and keep tending to your grapevines."

Bayliss-Smith, 46, a documentary cameraman who also has a kombucha drinks business, is not the only local vintner. He has pulled together a loose collective of cultivators who produce wine from several hidden city grape gardens nestled in back gardens and allotments across Bristol. It is sufficiently underground to have an official name yet, but the collective's WhatsApp group is named Vineyard Dreams.

Urban Vineyards Around the Globe

To date, the grower's plot is the only one registered in the Urban Vineyards Association's upcoming world atlas, which features better-known urban wineries such as the eighteen hundred vines on the hillsides of the French capital's renowned Montmartre neighbourhood and more than 3,000 vines overlooking and within Turin. The Italian-based charitable organization is at the forefront of a initiative re-establishing urban grape cultivation in historic wine-producing nations, but has discovered them throughout the globe, including cities in Japan, Bangladesh and Central Asia.

"Grape gardens help urban areas remain greener and more diverse. These spaces protect land from construction by creating permanent, yielding farming plots inside cities," says the organization's leader.

Similar to other vintages, those produced in cities are a product of the earth the plants grow in, the vagaries of the climate and the individuals who care for the fruit. "Each vintage represents the charm, community, landscape and history of a city," adds the spokesperson.

Mystery Eastern European Grapes

Back in Bristol, Bayliss-Smith is in a urgent timeline to harvest the vines he grew from a cutting abandoned in his garden by a Eastern European household. If the precipitation arrives, then the pigeons may take advantage to feast again. "This is the enigmatic Eastern European variety," he says, as he removes bruised and rotten grapes from the glistering bunches. "The variety remains uncertain their exact classification, but they're definitely disease-resistant. Unlike premium grapes – Burgundy grapes, white wine grapes and additional renowned European varieties – you need not treat them with chemicals ... this is possibly a unique cultivar that was bred by the Eastern Bloc."

Group Efforts Across the City

The other members of the collective are additionally making the most of bright periods between showers of autumn rain. At a rooftop garden with views of Bristol's glistening harbour, where medieval merchant vessels once floated with barrels of vintage from France and Spain, Katy Grant is collecting her dark berries from approximately fifty vines. "I love the smell of the grapevines. It is so evocative," she remarks, pausing with a container of fruit resting on her shoulder. "It recalls the fragrance of Provence when you roll down the vehicle windows on vacation."

The humanitarian worker, fifty-two, who has devoted more than two decades working for humanitarian organizations in conflict zones, unexpectedly took over the vineyard when she moved back to the UK from East Africa with her household in recent years. She felt an overwhelming duty to look after the vines in the garden of their recently acquired property. "This vineyard has already endured multiple proprietors," she says. "I really like the idea of environmental care – of handing this down to future caretakers so they can keep cultivating from the soil."

Sloping Gardens and Traditional Winemaking

Nearby, the final two members of the group are hard at work on the steep inclines of Avon Gorge. Jo Scofield has cultivated over 150 plants situated on terraces in her expansive property, which tumbles down towards the muddy local waterway. "People are always surprised," she says, indicating the tangled grape garden. "They can't believe they are viewing rows of vines in a urban neighborhood."

Currently, Scofield, 60, is picking bunches of dusty purple dark berries from lines of plants slung across the hillside with the help of her child, her family member. The conservationist, a wildlife and conservation film-maker who has contributed to streaming service's Great National Parks series and BBC Two's gardening shows, was motivated to cultivate vines after observing her neighbour's grapevines. She has learned that hobbyists can produce interesting, pleasurable traditional vintage, which can command prices of more than seven pounds a serving in the increasing quantity of wine bars focusing on low-processing vintages. "It's just deeply rewarding that you can truly create quality, traditional vintage," she states. "It's very fashionable, but in reality it's reviving an old way of making vintage."

"When I tread the fruit, the various wild yeasts are released from the surfaces and enter the liquid," says Scofield, ankle deep in a container of tiny stems, seeds and red liquid. "This represents how vintages were made traditionally, but industrial wineries introduce sulphur [dioxide] to eliminate the wild yeast and then incorporate a commercially produced yeast."

Difficult Conditions and Creative Approaches

A few doors down sprightly retiree Bob Reeve, who motivated Scofield to plant her grapevines, has assembled his companions to harvest white wine varieties from the 100 plants he has laid out neatly across multiple levels. Reeve, a northern English physical education instructor who taught at the local university cultivated an interest in wine on regular visits to Europe. But it is a difficult task to cultivate this particular variety in the dampness of the gorge, with cooling tides sweeping in and out from the Bristol Channel. "I wanted to produce Burgundian wines here, which is somewhat ambitious," says Reeve with a smile. "This variety is late to ripen and very sensitive to mildew."

"My goal was creating European-style vintages in this environment, which is a bit bonkers"

The unpredictable local weather is not the sole challenge encountered by winegrowers. Reeve has had to erect a barrier on