Vagabond Wines

Brilliant place to have a drinks night out. The basement level in particular, fitted with sofas and also a curtain enclosed area. It exudes quite a homely feel. Interesting selection of wine but the G&T was very mild. I wonder if they have forgotten the Gin.

What a gorgeous wine bar — and fun concept! A friend had hired the private space downstairs for his birthday, which looks like a living room that’s sprung to life from a 20s detective novel — lots of dark leather sofas, jazz music and low hanging ceiling lamps. It’s a beautiful looking space, and I esp loved the map artwork on the walls too.
We collected a prepaid card each from the desk upstairs — which my friend had v generously put £10 on for everyone attending. The concept is then self-​serve wines on tap, from special machines that keep it tasting delicious. There’s a decent selection downstairs of about 10 whites and 10 reds (and even more upstairs but we couldn’t be bothered to keep taking the stairs up after a few!) usefully arranged in taste categories, e.g. the white wines sorted by ‘dry’ then ‘crisp’ then ‘sweet’ and so on. Each wine itself then had a set of tasting notes, origin info and recommendations for food pairings that you could take away with you. Once you’ve chosen your wine you insert your card to show how much credit is on it, then select your serving size from a taster 25ml, 125ml and 175ml. I thought the taster sizes were a brilliant idea — usually £1−2 and useful to check if you want a whole glass of something. I also used them to try a small amount of some of the really expensive wines that I didn’t necessarily want to pay £13 for a glass!
Needless to say we had to pop back upstairs to reload the cards very soon, but you get your unspent money back at the end (as well as the £5 deposit you leave for the card itself). It’s easy to get carried away with the card system I suppose but there was some good quality stuff available even at the £5−7 a glass range, let alone the more special stuff. It’s quite low-​input in terms of staff, but they were nicely attentive in refilling water jugs and replacing the (surprising number of) bottles that reached empty. The birthday boy had also sensibly ordered some sharing food platters, and I can confirm a few of us took very good care of a yummy cheeseboard between us…
Highly recommend if you want something a little different than a regular wine bar, and is particularly good fun for any aspiring oenophiles — which obviously we all thought we were once we started tasting! Cue plenty of giggles and overuse of some very technical terms such as ‘grapefruity’, ‘raisiny’ and even ‘tastes like wine’… (that wasn’t me, fyi!).

What a wine bar! Their tasting system is as clever as it gets. Their wines won gold at the International Wine Challenge and their cheeseboards are swell. 5 stars all the way!

I had one of these Monday evenings when you just feel like unwinding after a stressful week start… 10 PM, a friend of mine and I are hanging out the area after a meetup around Brick Lane, and just feel like we need that last glass of wine before going home. Herer comes Vagabond!
The place is inside Old Spitalfields market, cozy, with smooth late night jazz in background. I really like the design of the place. VERY comfortable leather couches in the basement, I sat there just to try them. I definitely see myself going there with more friends again and just chill in that basement… But at the end of the day, it’s a wine bar. So let’s talk about wine, shall we?
Good selection, and very innovative concept. You can get your wine either in a bottle to share with your friends (unless you’re a solo drinker, indeed) or on tap. We went for the latter, so paid £25 and were handed a prepaid card. Each bottle on tap offers 3 options: sample (25ml), small glass (75ml) or large glass (125ml). They offer a sizeable collection of wine from both Old and New world, with pretty much all you palate would want: spicy, fruity, bold… I was expecting more French wines given my cultural heritage, but I can’t complain much for all the choice we had quality (nothing rubbish though) and price wise. For a 125ml, expect prices to range from £7 to £30+. But remember, you can always sample before picking!
Overall, good experience, I shall definitely go there again with pals or the missus. Earlier though, so we can also taste their cheese and charcuterie. I spotted some good bottles that go well with them… Lovely time guaranteed at Vagabond, can’t wait to return!