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Vinopolis, a London wine museum
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If perchance your travels take you to London, visit Vinopolis a wine museum and world wine tasting bar. Vinopolis is open to the public Thursdays through Sundays and offers a museum experience. I often try to find wine museums in my travels. I visited two wine museums in New York, one in Ontario, the smallest wine museum in San Gimignano, Italy and Vinopolis in London.
At Vinopolis you can trace the history of wine from its beginning in Georgia to the Old World countries then to the New World countries. For example, the tour began with displays that show that Georgia was the cradle of wine. A display about archeological evidence points out that viniculture took place in Georgia about 6000 BC with more than 500 grape varieties. An antique kvevri, once used to ferment wines, is on display. These 300-500 deciliter (over 1320 gallons) jugs would have been buried in the ground up to near the top in order to control temperature. Next, one travels through displays of the importance of Bordeaux and Rhone areas of France. The tour eventually leads to the United States and other New World wine producing countries. Different rooms offer displays, artifacts, posters, pictures and videos that trace wine’s history. The tour is self-guided. If you take your time and read all the display captions, you should plan a couple of hours.
Along the tour route, tasting tables have wines from around the world. I took the opportunity to taste wines from countries that I have never had wine from before. I enjoyed a Sauvignon Blanc from Israel. A slight detour from the wine tour leads to some rooms devoted to Bombay Sapphire, a dry gin distilled in London. You can learn about gin and have an opportunity to taste Bombay Sapphire cocktails.
While in the display rooms take a moment to notice the architecture of the ceilings. The arches were built by the South Eastern Railroad Company in 1866 and supported the Victorian railroad. Long before the railroad, the Romans once lived in this area south of the Thames. The name Vinopolis is from Latin and means vine city. Today it more aptly means wine center.
Vinopolis is centrally located in the Southwark section of London. From Vinopolis, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre is a four-minute walk and the Tate Modern Museum is just over a six-minute walk. An interesting walk is along the Thames going east from Vinopolis. Tower Bridge is about a twenty-minute walk while the Tower of London, on the northern side of the Thames, will take you about thirty minutes to walk. The tour of Vinopolis was very educational and Vinopolis employees were quite helpful and informative. When visiting London try to steal away a couple of hours and visit Vinopolis.
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