How South Africa became one of our brightest stars

How South Africa became one of our brightest stars

It feels like we’ve been talking to you about South African wine a lot lately.

Of course that’s in no small part because we’ve been joined by not one, but two outstanding new wineries in the last few months.

Then there was the epic interview with Vilafonté’s Mike Ratcliffe (read it if you haven’t already – trust us). And we recently sat down with Capensis for an interview every bit as mind-blowing, which we’ll be sharing soon.

Plus with South Africa’s Heritage Day coming up along with the perhaps-less-heralded International Pinotage Day and Fells House about to be descended on by whatever the collective noun for South African winemakers is … well, we’re on the cusp of just reserving our South Africa Brand Manager a seat at the Comms team desk.

It’s exciting times for our South Africa offering, in short – unprecedented times, even. And it occurred to us that we haven’t really taken a step back and looked at the whole thing.

A historic wine powerhouse now greater than ever

South Africa, perhaps more than anywhere, provides a check to the somewhat dated notions of ‘new world’ and ‘old world’ wine.

After all, when a country’s been growing vines since 1655 and Jane Austen’s characters were proscribing its wine as a cure for a broken heart, it probably doesn’t quite classify as a thrusting, young, dew-eyed newcomer.

At the same time, South Africa’s journey with wine has been far from linear. The decades South African wine spent in exile from the world stage in the late 20^th Century meant that the likes of Australia, California and New Zealand were able to surge ahead of it in reputation, vineyard research and expertise.

But as Mike Ratcliffe put it: ‘It probably took ten, fifteen, even twenty years to start getting back to world standards. But then the momentum didn’t stop and now there are several South African wines which are competing fairly comfortably with the greatest wines in the world. And I don’t think that momentum’s stopping, because there’s also a can-do attitude in South Africa.’

The best of South Africa in a nutshell

The more we think about our new-look South African Portfolio, the more firmly we believe that it represents not only the pinnacle of the country’s wines – but a cross-section of the breadth of South African excellence.

Look at Paul Clüver, for instance. The first to put vines down in Elgin Valley back in the eighties, they’re now lauded as one of South Africa’s ‘First Growths’ by Tim Atkin MW for their world-class Pinots and Chardonnays … and the region they pioneered wins over 50% of South Africa’s Gold medals for Chardonnay.

There couldn’t really be a better advert for the modern South African obsession with terroir exploration, innovation and single-minded focus on quality than Vilafonté. Their ‘M’ and ‘C’ Series are simply two of the best Bordeaux-style blends made anywhere in the world, and ‘Seriously Old Dirt’ is about as good value as wine gets.

Then there’s Capensis, with their exploration of Chardonnay’s potential barely-believable in its depth and breadth, from singular blends to custom-planted vineyards at Stellenbosch’s highest altitudes. Meanwhile Dalkeith’s hyperfocus on making the most detailed Syrah and Chenin possible from just three remarkable vineyards is mesmerising.

For far too long it has been almost the (somewhat lazy) fashion among some wine lovers to disparage Pinotage. But not among anyone who has tasted the breathtaking single vineyard expressions of Kaapzicht, and how extraordinarily different they can be, from the beautifully perfumed Skraalhans to the imperious, full-throated Rooiland.

(Not to mention they also work with the second-oldest Chenin Blanc vineyard in South Africa).

And then, amidst these outstanding specialists, there’s Warwick, whose founders did so much to put South Africa back where it belonged on the world’s wine map, and whose breadth of varieties and styles couldn’t be a better advert for Stellenbosch’s mesmerising range.

A Portfolio crown jewel

South African wine is looking simply radiant right now – and you’ll find the best of every aspect of it in our Portfolio.

We’re immensely proud and privileged to work with every winery we deal with around the world. And even in that auspicious company our South African makers stand out for their ambition, their focus, their sheer interestingness.

Not to mention how utterly delicious the wines are.

No doubt about it: a country whose wines deserve even more attention than they already get. Don’t expect us to stop talking about South Africa any time soon.