Taylor's is now over 300 years old. It remains a family firm, completely independent, owned still by relations of the original partners.

Taylor’s is the only Port wine shipper to remain completely independent throughout its 310 year history. It is still a family run company producing the highest quality Port wines that continue to fetch a premium at auction. Taylor’s is distributed in over 54 countries around the world.

Taylor, Fladgate & Yeatman has won prestigious awards for their declared vintages. Recently the Taylor 1992 was awarded a perfect 100 points from Robert Parker. The 1994 vintage also received 100 points and the Top Wine of the World award from the Wine Spectator.

The distinctive character of Port does not come only from its method of production. Like that of every great classic wine, it is also born of an association of climate, soil and grape variety unique in the world. Separated from the sea by the Marão mountains and protected from the rainy winds of the Atlantic, the Douro valley has a climate of baking, dry summers and severe winters. It is a land of austere beauty.

The vineyards are dizzyingly steep: the vines must be planted on tiers of walled terraces, towering one above the other like the steps of the Pyramids, the product of centuries of Herculean labour. To make new terraces in this rocky terrain, dynamite is often needed to blast away great outcrops of schist, the slate-like stone which forms the bedrock of the Douro's best vineyard soils. The vine roots can dive 40ft down through rock fissures in search of water, draining the very essence of the soil into every grape.

The Douro boasts a wealth of traditional grape varieties. Among the finest are the heavily-scented Tourigas-Touriga Nacional and Touriga Francesa-producing wine of enormous scale and concentration; the Tinta Roriz with its firm tannins and distinctive cedary nose; the supple, flowery Tinta Barroca; and the Tinta Cão, one of the oldest varieties cultivated in the Douro valley.

Taylor's were one of the earliest shippers to acquire vineyards to produce the wine themselves, rather than merely buying from wine-makers and then maturing it.

The famous Quinta de Vargellas, purchased between 1893 and 1896, is the jewel in the Taylor's crown. This magnificent 164-hectare estate, in the wildest, highest country of the Douro, is the source of much of the wine for Taylor's vintage Port. Set in a lovely bowl of vineyards sloping steeply down to the river, its north-facing site helps to moderate the fierce summer heat. Taylor's later bought another outstanding estate, Quinta de Terra Feita, occupying a spectacular site on the slopes of the Pinhão valley. Taylor's has extensively replanted this ancient property, bringing out the full potential of its 116 hectares of vineyard under vine which have supplied the firm with superb Ports for over a century.