My wine column for the Virginia Water Magazine, 2020-present and the Sunninghill and Ascot Magazine 2024-present
In 2020 I was asked to write a series of monthly wine columns for The Virginia Water Magazine (voted no.1 in the Small Magazine Category of the National Parish Magazine Awards 2021), and am making these available below for those who would like to read them (.png or .jpg images as well as larger sized .pdf versions – just click on the titles or images). The choice of wine recommendations each month is largely governed by a wish primarily to find wines that are available locally to exemplify the month’s theme, and that also reflect a variety of different price points. Since 2024, a selection of the same columns has also been published in the Sunninghill and Ascot Magazine (bimonthly), and so these have an overall hard copy reach of nearly 10,000 copies.
For those interested in finding out more about my academic writing on wine, do look at the list of references after the monthly columns below:
December 2024: Christmas and the New Year: gifts and celebrations
November 2024: Choosing food to go with your wine – not the other way round
October 2024: Tips on organising your own wine tasting
September 2024: Wines for Autumn BBQs
July-August 2024: If you can’t afford expensive Burgundy anymore, try these instead
June 2024: Supermarket and retailer own label wines
May 2024: Wine blogs and social media
April 2024: Austrian Wines
March 2024: Lower alcohol wines
February 2024: If you like this…, try this…
Deecember 2023 – January 2024: A sparkling Christmas and New Year.
November 2023: Return to Rioja
October 2023: The wines of Umbria – from the green heart of Italy
September 2023: South African updates
July-August 2023: Bottle closures
June 2023: The Magnificent Mosel
May 2023: Swiss Wines
April 2023: Reading wine labels
March 2023: The Middle Loire: The vineyards of La Touraine
February 2023: Mendoza – much more than Malbec
December 2022-January 2023: Wines for Christmas and the New Year
November 2022: Wines of Madeira – not just fortified
October 2022: Why all the fuss about organic and biodynamic wines?
September 2022: Money-wise wine buying
July-August 2022: Orange, Mudgee and the Southern Highlands, New South Wales
June 2022: Summer wines from Alsace
May 2022: North Island, New Zealand, Aotearoa
April 2022: Riesling Rhine Resurgence
March 2022: Monks, vineyards and wine
February 2022: Wine tourism: planning your next adventure
December 2021-January 2022: Rediscovering Sherry at Christmas
November 2021: Why taste?
October 2021: Malbec from Cahors to Argentina
September 2021: Italian white wines for late summer
July-August 2021: Merchants of Wine
May 2021: Wines for Spring
*apologies for typo: the first Beerenauslese should of course read Auslese
April 2021: Exploring lesser known grape varieties (Touriga Nacional, Petite Arvine, and Sagrantino)
March 2021: South Australian Specials
February 2021: Do glasses make a difference?
December 2020: A fortified Christmas
November 2020: South Africa: good value quality wines.
October 2020: Appreciating the diversity of Burgundy
September 2020: Getting to know the wines that you like
Some of my academic writing about wine
- Charters, S., Demossier, M., Dutton, J., Harding, G., Maguire, J., Marks, D. and Unwin, T. (eds) (2022) Routledge Handbook of Wine and Culture, London: Routledge (a prize winner at the OIV’s 2023 awards for a book on wine and history). Including single authored chapters as follows:
- Introduction, pp.1-11.
- Cultures of Terroir, pp.61-71.
- Geographers and the culture of wine, pp.35-40.
- Unwin, T. (2017) Geography of Wine, in: Wharf, B. (ed.) Oxford Bibliographies in Geography, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Unwin, T. (2012) Terroir: at the heart of Geography, in Dougherty, P. (ed.) The Geography of Wine: Regions, Terroir and Techniques, Amsterdam: Springer, 37-48.
- Unwin, T. (2005) Wine, in: McCusker, J.J. (ed.) History of World Trade since 1450, Farmington Hills: Macmillan References.
- Unwin, T. and Saeidi, A. (2004) Wine in the poetry of Hafiz, Journal of Wine Research, 15(2), 97-114.
- Unwin, T. (2001) From Montpellier to New England: John Locke on wine, in: Butlin, R.A. and Black, I. (eds) Place, culture and identity: essays in historical geography in honour of Dr. Alan R.H. Baker, Canada: Laval University Press, 69-90.
- Charters, S., Lockshin, L. and Unwin, T. (2007) Consumer responses to wine bottle back labels, Australian and New Zealand Wine Industry Journal, 15(3) 94-101..
- Unwin, T. (1999) Hedonic price indexes and the qualities of wine, Journal of Wine Research, 10(2), 95-104.
- Unwin, T. (1998) Locke’s interest in wine, The Locke Newsletter 29, 119-151.
- Unwin, T. (1997) El terrer i la Geografia del vi, Treballs de la Societat Catalana de Geografia, 45, 257-74.
- Unwin, T. (1996) Biochemistry and the wine industry, The Biochemist, 8(5), 9-12
- Unwin, T. (1994) European wine sector policy and the English wine industry, Journal of Wine Research, 5(ii), 135-46.
- Unwin, T. (1993) Wine in the early modern world-system: profit, production and exchange, in: H.-J. Nitz (ed.) The early modern world-system in geographical perspective, Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 248-64.
- Unwin, T. (1992) Images of alcohol: perceptions and the influence of advertising, Journal of Wine Research, 3(iii), 205-33
- Dickenson, J. and Unwin, T. (1992) Viticulture in colonial Latin America: essays on alcohol, the vine and wine in Spanish America and Brazil, Liverpool: University of Liverpool Centre for Latin American Studies, Working Paper No. 13
- Unwin, T. (1991) Wine and the Vine: an historical geography of viticulture and the wine trade, London: Routledge (revised paperback edition 1996; Italian edition as Storia del vino, 1993. Spanish revised edition as El vino y la viña, 2001; Greek edition Οίνος και άμπελος, 2003). “This book is for anyone who wants to know where wine came from and the role it has played throughout history” (Frank Prial, New York Times).
- Unwin, T. (1991) UK wine: from Table Wine to Quality Wine?, Journal of Wine Research, 2(ii), 143-50
- Unwin, T. (1990) Saxon and early Norman viticulture in England, Journal of Wine Research, 1(1), 61-75.
Additional contributions
- Unwin, T. (1994, 2014, 2021, 2023) Contributions to Robinson, J. (ed.) The Oxford companion to wine, Oxford: Oxford University Press (Claret 242; Containers 275-76; Gold rushes, 452; Grafting, history 455-56; Hygiene, history, 500-501; Delimitation, geographical 321-22; Monks and monasteries 629-31; Rivers 811-12; Stoppers 925; Sulphur, history 929; South America, history, 903-4) [updated for each new edition in 1999, 2006, 2015, and 2023]
- Unwin, T. (1995-1997) Regular column in Swedish magazine Dina Viner.
