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Each 20 minutes or so, an older diesel-powered railway carriage arrives at a spray-painted station. Close by, a law enforcement alarm pierces the near-constant road noise. Commuters hurry past collapsing, ivy-draped fencing panels as rain clouds gather.

This is maybe the least likely spot you expect to find a perfectly formed grape-growing plot. But one local grower has cultivated four dozen established plants sagging with plump purplish grapes on a rambling allotment situated between a line of 1930s houses and a commuter railway just above Bristol downtown.

"I've seen individuals concealing illegal substances or whatever in those bushes," states the grower. "Yet you simply continue ... and keep tending to your vines."

Bayliss-Smith, 46, a filmmaker who also has a kombucha drinks business, is not the only urban winemaker. He's organized a loose collective of growers who produce vintage from several discreet city grape gardens nestled in private yards and community plots throughout Bristol. The project is sufficiently underground to have an official name yet, but the collective's WhatsApp group is named Vineyard Dreams.

Urban Vineyards Across the World

So far, Bayliss-Smith's plot is the sole location listed in the City Vineyard Network's upcoming global directory, which features better-known city vineyards such as the 1,800 plants on the slopes of the French capital's historic artistic district neighbourhood and over 3,000 grapevines overlooking and inside Turin. Based in Italy charitable organization is at the forefront of a movement reviving city vineyards in traditional winemaking nations, but has discovered them all over the world, including cities in East Asia, Bangladesh and Central Asia.

"Vineyards assist cities stay more eco-friendly and more diverse. These spaces preserve open space from construction by creating permanent, yielding agricultural units inside urban environments," says the association's president.

Similar to other vintages, those produced in urban areas are a product of the earth the vines thrive in, the vagaries of the weather and the people who care for the fruit. "A bottle of wine embodies the beauty, local spirit, landscape and heritage of a urban center," notes the president.

Mystery Polish Grapes

Back in Bristol, Bayliss-Smith is in a urgent timeline to harvest the grapevines he grew from a cutting abandoned in his allotment by a Polish family. If the rain arrives, then the pigeons may seize their chance to feast once more. "This is the mystery Polish grape," he says, as he removes bruised and rotten grapes from the glistering clusters. "We don't really know their exact classification, but they're definitely hardy. Unlike premium grapes – Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and other famous French grapes – you need not treat them with pesticides ... this could be a unique cultivar that was developed by the Soviets."

Collective Efforts Throughout the City

Additional participants of the group are also making the most of bright periods between showers of autumn rain. On the terrace overlooking the city's glistening harbour, where medieval merchant vessels once floated with barrels of wine from France and Spain, Katy Grant is harvesting her dark berries from about fifty plants. "I love the smell of the grapevines. It is so evocative," she says, pausing with a basket of grapes resting on her shoulder. "It's the scent of Provence when you open the car windows on holiday."

Grant, 52, who has spent over 20 years working for humanitarian organizations in conflict zones, inadvertently took over the vineyard when she moved back to the UK from Kenya with her household in recent years. She experienced an strong responsibility to maintain the grapevines in the garden of their recently acquired property. "This plot has previously 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 this land."

Sloping Gardens and Traditional Winemaking

A short walk away, the remaining cultivators of the collective are busily laboring on the precipitous slopes of Avon Gorge. One filmmaker has established more than one hundred fifty vines perched on terraces in her expansive property, which tumbles down towards the silty local waterway. "Visitors frequently express amazement," she notes, gesturing towards the interwoven grape garden. "They can't believe they can see grapevine lines in a city street."

Today, the filmmaker, 60, is picking bunches of dusty purple Rondo grapes from lines of vines arranged along the cliff-side with the help of her child, Luca. The conservationist, a wildlife and conservation film-maker who has contributed to Netflix's nature programming and television network's Gardeners' World, was inspired to cultivate vines after seeing her neighbor's vines. She's discovered that amateurs can make interesting, pleasurable natural wine, which can command prices of more than £7 a serving in the increasing quantity of establishments focusing on low-processing vintages. "It's just deeply rewarding that you can actually make quality, traditional vintage," she states. "It is quite on trend, but really it's resurrecting an traditional method of producing wine."

"During foot-stomping the grapes, the various wild yeasts come off the skins into the liquid," says Scofield, partially submerged in a bucket of tiny stems, pips and red liquid. "This represents how vintages were historically produced, but commercial producers add sulphur [dioxide] to eliminate the wild yeast and subsequently incorporate a lab-grown culture."

Difficult Conditions and Creative Approaches

A few doors down active senior another cultivator, who inspired his neighbor to plant her grapevines, has assembled his companions to harvest Chardonnay grapes from one hundred vines he has laid out neatly across two terraces. The former teacher, a northern English physical education instructor who worked at the local university cultivated an interest in viticulture on annual sporting trips to Europe. However it is a difficult task to grow Chardonnay grapes in the dampness of the gorge, with temperature fluctuations sweeping in and out from the Bristol Channel. "I aimed to produce French-style vintages in this location, which is somewhat ambitious," says Reeve with amusement. "This variety is slow-maturing and very sensitive to mildew."

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

The unpredictable Bristol climate is not the only challenge encountered by winegrowers. The gardener has had to erect a barrier on