IDENTITY AND PHILOSOPHY:
“I believe wine’making’ can become obsolete when your vineyards are balanced within their own terroir and they express their site authentically with purity in the grapes, that way it becomes much more a ‘Guidance’ process in the cellar for me, rather than a ‘Making’ process. Being gentle, respecting the specific conditions of the vineyards and having patience in the winery unlocks a special terroir purity for me. The vineyards have done all the challenging work already and posses their own uniqueness in the final grapes, the winemaking should just curate the best of that all the way into the bottle.”
The wines are made with a natural and more traditional old world vinification approach to embrace the vineyard’s own character and to help keep terroir part of the final wine with a sense of purity.
Nature is one of my greatest inspirations since early childhood. It is difficult to put the experience into words. When you love nature there is this moment when you realise there exist a certain holistic balance in any surrounding that at first seems totally random and chaotic. A balance that is different for different places you find yourself in, each with its own set of variables playing a part. There is fulfilment and joy in that for me. To always be captivated in understanding this balance point of a vintage in the vineyard, the soil and the environment – which variables override it and how they interact through to the taste of the grapes.
That is why I choose to devote my wines to be part of this holistic balance. To not alter the winemaking techniques in the cellar just to fit in a certain criteria. To be dedicated in understanding each vintage and making those crucial decisions of picking the grapes at a certain time where it both respects the vines health as well as have a unique taste balance and then be bold enough to not change your core winemaking decisions. Let the vineyard and vintage decide what the wines will taste like each vintage and keep the wines as pure as possible to its own unique balance. That is often harder than it sounds, but the fulfilment of the final wine is always more rewarding for me.
APPROACH IN THE CELLAR:
In a nutshell – Focussing on getting healthy vibrant grapes from the vineyards each year by skilful and sensitive agriculture decisions. No commercially cultivated yeasts or fermentation aids are used. No manipulations to the juice or wines and no filtration. Sanitation and cleanliness in the cellar is key and a borderline obsession. The only “additive” I value is minute amounts of sulphur, little to none at crushing and some a few days before bottling. Grapes are processed when still freshly handpicked off the vine at the break of dawn. These fresh, firm and undamaged grapes are transported as wholebunches in 18kg lugboxes to the winery as soon as its harvested. Fermentation vats are handfilled. Fermentations are slow and with spontaneous vineyard yeasts in open top fermenters. Ageing (élevage) takes place in older french oak barrels (no new oak) of varying sizes for varying times – depending on the vineyard. The role of keeping healthy lees during élevage is important to keep a sense of purity. Whites all enjoy some skin maceration, to individual extent, with ample cool cellar temperatures throughout fermentation in order to extract slightly more from the grapes’ unique vintage flavour and texture. Bottled after careful racking, unfiltered and unfined.
BLENDED RELEASES:
NOMADIS (Red blend)
SENOR TALLOS (Skin macerated white blend)
SINGLE VINEYARD RELEASES:
FÉNIKS (Pinotage) – Single Vineyard
GRANIETSTEEN (Chenin blanc) – Single Vineyard
SWANESANG (Syrah) – Single Vineyard
HELDERVALLEI (Cinsaut) – Single Vineyard
GRAMADOELAS (Grenache blanc) – Single Vineyard