The Fine Wine Guide · 2026

Champagne & fine wine in London.

Where to buy the extraordinary — from a 320-year-old merchant with two royal warrants to Mayfair's most talked-about wine boutique.

An independent guide. Some merchant links may earn a referral fee — it never affects our recommendations. Please drink responsibly.
The Great Merchants

Where London buys its finest bottles

London is one of the world's great fine-wine cities. These are the houses worth visiting in person — as much for the cellars and the expertise as the bottles themselves.

Est. 1698 · St James's

Berry Bros. & Rudd

Britain's oldest wine and spirit merchant, trading from the same shop since 1698, with two royal warrants. Shelves span £5 to £5,000, five Masters of Wine, a wine school and cellar-plan storage.

3 St James's Street & 63 Pall Mall
Est. 2012 · Mayfair

Hedonism Wines

The most talked-about wine project of recent times — 6,500 wines and 3,000 spirits over two floors on Davies Street, with rare bottles and vertical-tasting selections. Enomatic machines let you taste before you buy.

3–7 Davies Street, Mayfair
Est. 1707 · Piccadilly

Fortnum & Mason

The Piccadilly institution's wine room carries a strong selection of classic champagnes and sparkling wines — and doubles as one of London's great gift destinations.

181 Piccadilly
Go for the experience: Berry Bros. runs cellar dinners, champagne evenings and tastings in its historic St James's cellars; Hedonism and The Sampler let you taste rare bottles by the glass on Enomatic machines. Worth booking ahead — these are experiences, not just shops.
The Champagne Question

Buying champagne in London

Whether you're after a grower's grand cru or a mature vintage, London's merchants carry depth you won't find on a supermarket shelf. A few ways to buy well.

Grande marque, safe gift

A well-known house in a Fortnum's or Berry Bros. box — reliably impressive, and beautifully presented
Gifting

Grower champagne

Grand-cru bottles from small producers — Berry Bros. and Hedonism both carry names you can't easily find elsewhere
Enthusiast

Mature vintage

Aged champagne from a merchant's own cellar — the kind of bottle that justifies a special trip
Collector

English sparkling

The home-grown rival — Hambledon and others now sit alongside champagne on the best lists
British
A British note: don't overlook English sparkling wine — Berry Bros. now bottles its own English sparkling rosé, and the category increasingly holds its own against champagne. A characterful, very British thing to bring home.
What to Bring Home

The bottle worth the suitcase space

The gift

A boxed grande marque

From Fortnum's or Berry Bros. — presentation-ready, universally recognised, and hard to get wrong.

The talking point

A grower champagne

Something your friends can't buy at home. Ask any merchant's staff to point you to a small-producer bottle with a story.

The British choice

English sparkling wine

Distinctive, increasingly acclaimed, and unmistakably from here. The most characterful bottle to carry out of Britain.

Practical tip: check your airline's rules and your home country's duty-free allowance before buying to carry back — and let the merchant pack bottles properly for the hold, or arrange shipping for anything valuable.

Carrying bottles across town

Fine wine and public transport don't mix well. Our partner RushXO runs fixed-price transfers across London — the civilised way to get precious cargo back to your hotel.

Book a transfer with RushXO →
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