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Each quarter of an hour or so, an ageing diesel railway carriage arrives at a spray-painted station. Close by, a police siren cuts through the almost continuous traffic drone. Commuters hurry past falling apart, ivy-covered fencing panels as storm clouds form.

It is perhaps the last place you expect to find a well-established grape-growing plot. But James Bayliss-Smith has cultivated four dozen established plants heavy with plump purplish grapes on a rambling garden plot sandwiched between a line of 1930s houses and a commuter railway just north of the city downtown.

"I've noticed people hiding illegal substances or whatever in the shrubbery," says Bayliss-Smith. "But you simply continue ... and keep tending to your grapevines."

Bayliss-Smith, forty-six, a filmmaker who also has a kombucha drinks business, is not the only local vintner. He's pulled together a loose collective of growers who make vintage from several hidden urban vineyards tucked away in private yards and community plots across Bristol. The project is sufficiently underground to have an formal title yet, but the collective's WhatsApp group is named Grape Expectations.

Urban Wine Gardens Around the Globe

So far, Bayliss-Smith's allotment is the only one registered in the Urban Vineyards Association's upcoming world atlas, which features more famous city vineyards such as the eighteen hundred plants on the hillsides of the French capital's historic artistic district area and over three thousand vines with views of and inside Turin. The Italian-based charitable organization is at the vanguard of a initiative re-establishing city vineyards in historic wine-producing countries, but has discovered them throughout the globe, including cities in East Asia, South Asia and Central Asia.

"Vineyards help cities stay more eco-friendly and more diverse. These spaces protect open space from construction by establishing permanent, productive agricultural units within urban environments," explains the association's president.

Similar to other vintages, those created in cities are a result of the earth the plants grow in, the unpredictability of the weather and the individuals who tend the fruit. "Each vintage represents the charm, local spirit, landscape and history of a city," adds the president.

Mystery Eastern European Grapes

Back in the city, Bayliss-Smith is in a race against time to gather the vines he cultivated from a cutting left in his garden by a Eastern European household. Should the rain arrives, then the pigeons may take advantage to attack once more. "This is the enigmatic Polish variety," he comments, as he removes damaged and rotten berries from the shimmering clusters. "We don't really know their exact classification, but they're definitely hardy. In contrast to premium grapes – Pinot Noir, white wine grapes and other famous European varieties – you don't have to treat them with pesticides ... this is possibly a unique cultivar that was bred by the Soviets."

Collective Activities Across the City

The other members of the collective are also making the most of sunny interludes between bursts of fall precipitation. On the terrace overlooking the city's glistening harbour, where medieval merchant vessels once bobbed with barrels of wine from Europe and Spain, one cultivator is harvesting her rondo grapes from about 50 vines. "I adore the smell of the grapevines. It is so reminiscent," she says, stopping with a container of fruit slung over her arm. "It's the scent of Provence when you open the car windows on vacation."

The humanitarian worker, 52, who has devoted more than two decades working for charitable groups in war-torn regions, inadvertently took over the vineyard when she moved back to the UK from East Africa with her household in recent years. She felt an strong responsibility to look after the grapevines in the garden of their new home. "This plot has already survived three different owners," she says. "I deeply appreciate the concept of natural stewardship – of passing this on to future caretakers so they keep cultivating from the soil."

Terraced Vineyards and Natural Production

Nearby, the remaining cultivators of the group are hard at work on the precipitous slopes of Avon Gorge. Jo Scofield has established over 150 plants situated on terraces in her expansive property, which tumbles down towards the silty local waterway. "People are always surprised," she notes, indicating the interwoven vineyard. "It's astonishing to them they can see grapevine lines in a urban neighborhood."

Today, Scofield, 60, is harvesting clusters of deep violet Rondo grapes from rows of vines slung across the cliff-side with the assistance of her daughter, her family member. The conservationist, a documentary producer who has contributed to Netflix's nature programming and television network's Gardeners' World, was inspired to plant grapes after seeing her neighbor's grapevines. She has learned that amateurs can make interesting, enjoyable traditional vintage, which can sell for more than £7 a serving in the increasing quantity of wine bars focusing on minimal-intervention vintages. "It is deeply rewarding that you can truly make quality, traditional vintage," she says. "It's very on trend, but really it's resurrecting an traditional method of producing vintage."

"During foot-stomping the grapes, all the wild yeasts come off the surfaces and enter the juice," explains Scofield, partially submerged in a container of tiny stems, seeds and crimson juice. "That's how vintages were made traditionally, but commercial producers add preservatives to kill the natural cultures and then add a lab-grown culture."

Difficult Conditions and Creative Solutions

A few doors down active senior Bob Reeve, who inspired Scofield to plant her vines, has assembled his friends to harvest Chardonnay grapes from the 100 plants he has laid out neatly across multiple levels. Reeve, a Lancashire-born PE teacher who taught at the local university cultivated an interest in wine on regular visits to France. But it is a difficult task to cultivate this particular variety in the dampness of the gorge, with cooling tides moving through from the nearby estuary. "I aimed to produce Burgundian wines in this location, which is somewhat ambitious," says Reeve with a smile. "This variety is slow-maturing and particularly vulnerable to mildew."

"I wanted to make Burgundian wines in this environment, which is a bit bonkers"

The unpredictable Bristol climate is not the sole challenge faced by grape cultivators. Reeve has been compelled to erect a fence on