Mike Ratcliffe, proprietor and co-founder of the main South African property.
The Wine Advocate is but to grant any South African wine an ideal rating – however some are getting shut. Most not too long ago, Vilafonté earned 99 factors for its 2021 Sequence C. Because it’s launched, we sit down with proprietor Mike Ratcliffe to seek out out about this Paarl challenge and its speedy trajectory to stardom.
Broad in construct and sporting a leather-based necklace, Mike Ratcliffe appears like a person who could be good at wrangling cattle. However that burly aspect is countered by an accent softened by time working and finding out overseas (to not point out being married to a Brit), and a sure polish – even after an in a single day flight from the Cape – that speaks of the enterprise sphere. It’s clear that he’s no-nonsense – a person with ambition, and never one, I think, you’d need to get on the flawed aspect of. However it’s additionally clear that his savvy brand-building has been key to the success of Vilafonté
He’s a person with a plan – a 100-year plan, the truth is. As of December final 12 months, when co-founders Dr Zelma Lengthy and Dr Phil Freese retired, Ratcliffe is the lone man on the helm of Vilafonté – a wine producer that has been attracting rising quantities of consideration. In a latest report for the Wine Advocate, Anthony Mueller wrote, “Vilafonté continues inching towards triple digits with a spectacular array of recent releases” – awarding its 2021 Sequence C 99 factors (making it the joint-highest-scoring South African wine thus far, sitting alongside Sadie’s 2021 Palladius and an 1800 Muscat of Alexandria from Jaubert). However Ratcliffe’s not resting on his laurels: as he tells me, “In case you’re going to do something, go 100%.”
Vilafonté’s 2021 Sequence C is South Africa’s joint highest-scoring wine thus far on the Wine Advocate.
Ratcliffe’s household owned Warwick Property – and because the world opened as much as South African wine within the wake of apartheid – they realised they wanted assist growing their wines. Though Warwick was one of many nation’s stalwart names, “We have been the massive fish within the small pond,” says Ratcliffe – and to develop internationally, they wanted exterior enter. They employed Phil Freese – then Vice President of Winegrowing at Robert Mondavi and liable for planting the primary Opus One vineyards – as viticultural advisor (for a “staggering” $1,000 a day, Ratcliffe tells me). The funding paid off and after two years, they’d made wonderful progress – and Freese recommended they use Zelma Lengthy (beforehand of Robert Mondavi, then Simi) to seek the advice of on the winemaking aspect.
On the similar time Freese was engaged on his PhD, which concerned analysis on the world’s oldest soils – lots of which he found have been in southern Africa. The oldest documented soil in Africa is vilafontes, thought to have originated 800 million years in the past – and he, together with Zelma (whom he later married), began questioning about this soil’s potential for wine. The couple – together with the assistance of an investor Sydney Again – purchased 40 hectares of land in 1996, on the foot of the Simonsberg mountain in Paarl, planting their first vines the next 12 months. Vilafonté was born.
The dramatic backdrop to the Vilafonté vineyards
Ratcliffe had been working overseas as a skipper, earlier than heading off to Roseworthy to get his MBA in wine in 1999, however had met Lengthy and Freese via their work at Warwick, and was maintaining a tally of their new enterprise. Quickly after he returned again house, Sydney Again – a person Ratcliffe describes as “the Robert Mondavi of South Africa” – handed away, that means Lengthy and Freese have been in search of a brand new associate. Impulsively, Ratcliffe volunteered – scrambling to get the cash collectively in time for the deal to be finalised in 2001.
The trio made wines in 2000 and 2001 however solely to get a really feel for the location, planning to make 2002 their first launch. Sadly, the classic was difficult and Lengthy informed them firmly: “It’s good – but it surely’s not adequate.” It’s a call that the financial institution didn’t essentially recognize (“That was a troublesome 12 months,” says Ratcliffe) – however allowed them to launch with 2003, “arguably the perfect classic of the last decade” in keeping with Ratcliffe (and a wine that he tells me remains to be “impeccable”). Nobody appears to be clear on how “vilafontes” grew to become Vilafonté – whether or not it was a advertising and marketing choice so as to add a Gallic twist to the title, or only a mistake someplace alongside the way in which – but it surely caught.
They’d initially deliberate to make a single Grand Vin, however the website had different concepts – producing two distinct types, and they also created Sequence C (a Cabernet-driven mix) and Sequence M (a Merlot-driven mix). It could not make good enterprise sense, having two flagship wines, however repeat experiments have (to this point, at the very least) confirmed it was the precise selection. Whereas some plots clearly belong to C or M, the blends are completely different every year – and younger-vine fruit or something that doesn’t match is declassified to Critically Previous Grime. This latter wine was launched with the 2012 classic, utilizing bought fruit from across the Western Cape in addition to declassified plots to supply an earlier-drinking entry-point to the Vilafonté model.
The key to the wines is the soil – extremely poor, historic soils, degraded and nutrient-deficient – that means the vines actually wrestle. Even 27 years on, the vines are scrawny little issues – producing tiny yields of concentrated fruit. It’s one motive that the location had – to their information – by no means been planted, and native farmers have been puzzled why anybody determined to place down roots right here. Mix that with a “deeply pragmatic” strategy (in Ratcliffe’s personal phrases), and a long-term workforce devoted to doing “the identical factor again and again and over”, and you’ve got the recipe for one thing particular. In Ratcliffe’s thoughts, it’s key that they aren’t attempting to create one thing new every classic – however proceed their pursuit of perfection with Sequence C and M. They work sustainably however sensibly, with cowl crops, high-tech underground drip irrigation and a cellar that operates purely on solar energy, however keep away from certification or buying and selling on any inexperienced credentials: for the Vilafonté workforce, it’s all concerning the high quality within the bottle.
The traditional vilafontes soils that outline this Paarl property
For years, Ratcliffe juggled managing each Warwick and Vilafonté, however finally offered his previous household enterprise to a California-based enterprise capital fund, permitting him to focus completely on Vilafonté. The property has simply launched its 2021s, the 18th classic to emerge from the Paarl property – and its top-scoring wines thus far. But Ratcliffe is evident that that is simply the newest step in his masterplan. The vines are but to show 30, and there are just a few small parcels on the property that would nonetheless be planted, whereas the workforce is consistently operating trials – empowered to problem all the pieces they suppose they know. Simply final December (2023), Lengthy and Freese retired – after a four-year handover interval, however will stay loosely concerned. Ratcliffe isn’t wanting again, although: as he says, “Our biggest wines are forward of us.”
