A VINEYARD is celebrating after coming back from a disastrous 2012 harvest with three international awards.

Highdown Vineyard, near Worthing, beat wines from around the world to win silver and bronze medals at the Decanter World Wine Awards and a bronze medal at the International Wine and Spirit Competition.

Aly and Paul Englefield, who have owned Highdown since 2010, produced just 962 bottles of wine in 2012 – compared to around 7,000 in a normal year. But the 2013 harvest proved to be a bumper year, with 14,500 bottles of award-winning wine.

Aly said: “The impact on the business meant that we had to build the functions, weddings and events side of the business, which is now flourishing. It’s fantastic that we can now serve award winning wines at our functions.

“Nothing makes us happier than seeing people drinking wines from the vines that they can see from the restaurant.

“When the results came in we were absolutely thrilled. It is a great endorsement and a huge achievement for a small vineyard such as ours to be able to compete and win medals on the world stage.

“We hope it is just a start. The conditions for this year have been fantastic so far and our vines have begun flowering, giving hope for another excellent yield and even better wines next year.

“We want to improve even more and keep on making better and better wines.”