Red Wines

Chad and Bree Stock, a husband-and-wife team, have merged their superpowers and unique backgrounds in wine to create Ltd. +, which emerged as a collaboration with farmers in the area, inspired to develop a diverse and sustainable wine landscape. The wines, often made from less common grape varieties adopting innovative techniques, are changing preconceived notions of Oregon wine.

Blair and Caroline Guthrie are making honest wines, farmed responsibly. Their baby side project (only 600 cases a year) is filled with so much love – their wines are comforting and lighthearted as a Sunday morning dance party in your bathrobe. Beneath that, they are strongly focused on preserving and encouraging the good in the world – environmentally, ethically and everything in between.

Blair and Caroline Guthrie are making honest wines, farmed responsibly. Their baby side project (only 600 cases a year) is filled with so much love – their wines are comforting and lighthearted as a Sunday morning dance party in your bathrobe. Beneath that, they are strongly focused on preserving and encouraging the good in the world – environmentally, ethically and everything in between.

This tiny operation, started in 2007 by the spirited Sardinian Antonio Berritta, operates out of the basement of a grocery store. Antonio, his wife Maria Paola and their kids, Serena and Francesco are all involved in the operations of the winery – under the meticulous direction of the grandkids. Antonio’s family has been cultivating olives and vines using traditional methods for generations. This stuff really is in their blood!

So much of our approach to wine has been inspired by Pieter Walser and his BLANKbottle wines – where the bottles typically don’t show the varietal to avoid any preconceived ideas about what people think they like and don’t like when it comes to wines. “You can’t judge it by the label; it takes drinking a whole bottle to get to know the wine.” He also designs those labels.

Chad and Bree Stock, a husband-and-wife team, have merged their superpowers and unique backgrounds in wine to create Ltd. +, which emerged as a collaboration with farmers in the area, inspired to develop a diverse and sustainable wine landscape. The wines, often made from less common grape varieties adopting innovative techniques, are changing preconceived notions of Oregon wine.

Baby-brother brand to Sokol Blosser, this started as a project to continue releasing wines when a nasty pest called phylloxera wiped out most of their vineyards. Through luck and intention, it has evolved (see what we did there?) into a brand in it’s own right under siblings & co-presidents Alison & Alex Sokol Blosser.

Jacques de Klerk, viticulturist and winemaker at Radford Dale by day, makes tiny batches of Chenin and Pinotage under his own brand, Reverie – started the year his first daughter was born. Reverie is an exploration of old vineyard sites, old winemaking styles and an old school passion for experimenting with the potential of familiar grapes to be something completely different

Kottabos takes its name from an ancient Greek drinking game, where after a few glasses of wine, friends would fling leftover lees toward targets—because why not? In this case, it's a side project from Reenen Borman of Boschkloof, designed for experimentation beyond his family’s estate. A second-generation winemaker, Reenen has earned a reputation as one of South Africa’s best (casually – he’s been awarded more 99 points by international critics than any other South African winemaker in history, and one of less than 10 to be awarded 100 pts), bringing both technical skill and instinct to Boschkloof’s vineyards. After studying at Elsenburg and gaining hands-on experience in the Rhône Valley, he returned to Stellenbosch to refine the wines that have shaped his name over the years. That dedication was recognised in 2023 when he became a member of the prestigious Cape Winemakers Guild—an honour reserved for only around 40 winemakers in South Africa. (Niels at Luddite is also one of the OG members!)

Blair and Caroline Guthrie are making honest wines, farmed responsibly. Their baby side project (only 600 cases a year) is filled with so much love – their wines are comforting and lighthearted as a Sunday morning dance party in your bathrobe. Beneath that, they are strongly focused on preserving and encouraging the good in the world – environmentally, ethically and everything in between.

Khayelitsha, located on the fringes of Cape Town, is a sprawling township a hangover from the Group Areas Act of the Apartheid regime. Lindile Ndzaba, who was born and raised, and still lives in Khayelitsha is looking to transform the narrative of wines in South Africa. In a country where the vast majority of citizens don’t have access to transport to visit wine farms or the money to spend in expensive city restaurants or bars – he realised he needed to bring fine wine culture to his community, and by doing this also start shifting the mindset of wine for consumption to wine for appreciation. Good wine he believes should be available to all South Africans and not just the privileged. And so, he launched Khayelitsha’s Finest Wines.

The vision of KFW is to see the townships develop and have their own resources to produce products without outsourcing. Not only does Lindile aim to grow his business internationally, but he also wants to encourage the community to work together to further the mindset of “supporting local brands.” He aims to continually provide jobs and, in essence, fight unemployment in the community of Khayelitsha.

So much of our approach to wine has been inspired by Pieter Walser and his BLANKbottle wines – where the bottles typically don’t show the varietal to avoid any preconceived ideas about what people think they like and don’t like when it comes to wines. “You can’t judge it by the label; it takes drinking a whole bottle to get to know the wine.” He also designs those labels.

Chad and Bree Stock, a husband-and-wife team, have merged their superpowers and unique backgrounds in wine to create Ltd. +, which emerged as a collaboration with farmers in the area, inspired to develop a diverse and sustainable wine landscape. The wines, often made from less common grape varieties adopting innovative techniques, are changing preconceived notions of Oregon wine.

“A dope-smoking political anarchist meets an upstanding young goody-goody sportsman at a mutual friend's 21st” – 35 years and 3 kids later, they are the family behind Luddite Wines. After a few years abroad, Niels and Penny returned to South Africa and found their plot of land in Bot River. Niels had a definite plan as to how he wanted to make wine and Penny knew that she wanted to farm as “green” as possible. Everything had to be about the wine. No intervention, no shortcuts and staying true to only bottling what, hand on heart was the best.

The story of Ottomani began with four friends who grew up together and turned a dream into reality. Not that far off from us girls at Crushed!

They graduated from the University of Florence with Oenology (that’s the science of wine) degrees and chose to separate for a while to get some exposure working in real wineries. With a few years of experience and some real savoir-faire in their back pockets, the boys came back together and purchased a farm of their own. In 2006, Ottomani was born with indigenous grape preservation and sustainability sowed into its mission statement.

“A dope-smoking political anarchist meets an upstanding young goody-goody sportsman at a mutual friend's 21st” – 35 years and 3 kids later, they are the family behind Luddite Wines. After a few years abroad, Niels and Penny returned to South Africa and found their plot of land in Bot River. Niels had a definite plan as to how he wanted to make wine and Penny knew that she wanted to farm as “green” as possible. Everything had to be about the wine. No intervention, no shortcuts and staying true to only bottling what, hand on heart was the best.

Sons of Sugarland forms part of Saga Vineyards - the latest adventure from Reenen Borman, Fritz Schoon, and Henk Kotze —a trio who knows how to turn unexpected vineyard sites into something truly special. We couldn’t write it better than they have themselves: “Halfway between here and nowhere, you’ll turn left into a vineyard that doesn’t look like anything special. Most of the time it isn’t. But sometimes it is. Saga Vineyards is born from these remarkable sites, often in unexpected places, growing fascinating wines that represent not just stories, but epic tales of adventure, persistence and survival.”

Reenen followed his father Jacques Borman’s footsteps into winemaking and has carved his own path with Saga Vineyards, while Fritz juggles business, baking, and family, and Henk keeps the momentum going. Their journey started above a bakery in Stellenbosch with Hawk & Schoon, a boutique wine shop where the first seeds of Saga were planted. Today, their Sons of Sugarland wines stay true to that ethos—whole bunch fermentation, concrete ageing, and nothing else. Just pure, expressive wine that lets the vineyard speak for itself.

This tiny operation, started in 2007 by the spirited Sardinian Antonio Berritta, operates out of the basement of a grocery store. Antonio, his wife Maria Paola and their kids, Serena and Francesco are all involved in the operations of the winery – under the meticulous direction of the grandkids. Antonio’s family has been cultivating olives and vines using traditional methods for generations. This stuff really is in their blood!