Sophie Thorpe reports from day one of the London Wine Fair – the UK’s most important trade forum, and a hotbed of views, opinion and exciting new wines. As Miles Beale, Chief Executive of the Wine & Sprits Trade Association (WSTA), so succinctly stated in his industry briefing, “the London Wine Fair matters and it […]

Tackling the inescapable issue of health, an article from a 1989 edition of our Number Three magazine ponders how far the wine merchant’s duty of care extends, establishing an attitude of “true temperance”. Like most of life’s pleasures, from sunbathing to ski-ing, drinking alcohol can have its hazards if it is not done sensibly – and recently […]

Following on from yesterday’s post, Richard Hemming MW pens a response to the HoseMaster of Wine – affectionately imitating the satirical writer’s style, which we trust he will find as flattering as receiving 100 points from any of the critics whose ankles he yaps at. Dear HoseMaster, I very much enjoyed your piece about homeless […]

While often the butt of jokes, the world of wine isn’t necessarily known for its sense of humour: but the HoseMaster of Wine is rapidly changing this, calling the wine trade’s bluff with his cruelly comic prose. We asked satirical wine writer Ron Washam (AKA the HoseMaster himself) to write this month’s guest post. They […]