David Gleave MW is the founder and managing director of Liberty Wines, London. Gleave was born and educated in Toronto, Canada. His family moved to Vancouver in 1976, where he briefly attended the University of British Columbia. He took time off from his studies to travel to Europe in 1978, but, after hitch-hiking through France, Germany and Italy to Greece and Israel, he returned to London to live. He worked at a variety of jobs, mostly related to catering, before moving to Dublin in 1980. He spent two and a half years there, and first developed his interest in wines. His first wine was Italian, a Chianti Classico he drank at his parents’ table (Gleave, 1989, p.6).

He returned to London in 1983. He passed the Master of Wine examination in 1986 and became one of the UK wine trade’s foremost authorities on Italian wine. He became wine buyer for both Winecellars (in Wandsworth) and The Market chain of shops in London.

Books

David Gleave, ‘The Wines of Italy‘ (Salamander Books, London, 1989).