VAN LOGGERENBERG WINES
Paarl, South Africa
Teddy Roosevelt said, “speak softly and carry a big stick…you will go far,” and Lukas Van Loggerenberg personifies that. Lukas arrived in the South African wine scene in a very unassuming manner. He didn’t grow up surrounded by wine and his overseas work post-graduation from Elsenburg College (not the more famous Stellenbosch University) was working two harvests on the East Coast of the United States. He didn’t even work in the Finger Lakes or even Long Island, but at a small winery in the Western Connecticut Highlands AVA. Lukas then returned to South Africa and worked at the obscure Druk My Niet Estate in Paarl.
In late 2015 he and his former college roommate Reenen Borman (Boschkloof) decided to take a holiday with their wives to the Loire Valley, where a visit to Domaine de la Chevaliere forever changed his life. After that trip he told his wife Roxanne that he wanted to make the switch from a being salary-earner to going out on his own.
He has gone from a small makeshift cellar to a medium-sized, organized cellar that he shares with his good friend Franco Lourens of Lourens Family Wines. For Lukas, the camaraderie of life is what makes wine all worth it. He is devoted to patches of soils scattered throughout the Western Cape, and he likes to think of himself as a farmer rather than a winemaker. He reveres the land, and as a result he chooses to make his wines in the most natural manner, eschewing the use of any additions other than sulfur dioxide. His rise to the summit of South African winemaking in a very short time speaks to Lukas’ pursuit of knowledge and his love of friends and family.