The English Sparkling Wine bottles at Four Acres Estate are 'riddled' or turned by hand twice a day for a minimum of two weeks before they are are manually degorged, dosaged, corked and muzzled. Then they are shaken by Sharron, a minimum of ten times for each bottle to get the dosage fully mixed with the sparkling wine (under the supervision of a master wine maker), before Sharron climbs a ladder and stacks the bottles on the top wire cage. Sharron is in fact our fork-lift truck for the day.

Platon :-)

I went down to the local Little Hadham farmers' market which takes place once a month in the village hall and I met the local beekeeper Rob Gabriel. His honey is very popular in the village and that gave me the idea of putting a couple of beehives in to help pollinate the 200 plus apple trees in the Four Acres Estate orchard.

I spoke to Bob Bayford, my friend and builder, and I said "Bob, I met Rob the beekeeper and I want to ask him to put a couple of hives in my apple orchard. Do you know him?“ "Yes" he said, in a dry, quiet voice. “He did me a favour once...” I looked at him and asked, "What was that Bob?" He replied, “He married my sister.” I was in stitches for weeks!

Very happy to report that the bee hives have now arrived and the honey is superb. For the best honey in Little Hadham, see www.gabrielshoneyfarm.co.uk

We are getting towards needing to apply our lovely labels to the bottles and it's important to place them in exactly the same place on each bottle, always ensuring they are straight. The options were to purchase a hugely expensive industrial machine, which seemed to go against the artisan ethos of Four Acres Estate, or to go for a hand-crafted traditional solution in the form of a clever positioning jig.

The inspiration for the pictured, highly sophisticated piece of engineering came from Debbie at Shetland Reel Gin ( www.shetlandreel.com ); the best gin company north of the border.

This wonderful contraption was actually made for us by Chip Chipperfield (www.chipperfieldwoodturners.co.uk). His tiny family business operates from a shed in Spellbrook, Hertfordshire and it appears there is nothing Chip cannot make out of wood; the man is a master craftsman!