Newlands’ Vineyard Hotel has been named on prestigious online wine portal Vinepair’s list of the “World’s Most Amazing Wine Themed Hotels”.
With only two hotels representing Africa – the other being Ellerman House in Bantry Bay – the list includes the La Grande Maison de Bernard Magrez in Bordeaux, the Rathaus Wine & Design Hotel in Vienna, Praktik Vinoteca in Barcelona and Hotel Vintage in Seattle.
Vinepair’s Emily Bell said of the Vineyard Hotel: “Another super-appropriately named hotel, as the Vineyard Hotel does indeed have its own vineyard. And despite being two centuries old – it was founded in 1799 – it’s a luxury hotel with modern green infrastructural components. And, yes, plenty of local and regional wine.
The hotel’s general manager Roy Davies said: “We were delighted to discover that we’d been ranked among the world’s top wine-themed hotels.”
In 2014, New York-based Travel & Leisure magazine honoured the Vineyard Hotel in its Travel & Leisure Global Vision Awards for its sustainability efforts, recognising it as a “beacon of energy-efficient hospitality”.
Turning to Ellerman House, Ms Bell said the fact that it had a 7500-strong collection of South African wines was not the only thing that made it a “wine hotel”.
“There’s also the incredible corkscrew-shaped carbon wine rack that houses some of that collection in the hotel’s wine gallery. Plus proximity to wineries. All of that wine for an 11-room boutique hotel. Yes please.”
The establishment’s sommelier, Manuel Cabello, said it “is always good to be acknowledged and recognised for what we do”.
He added: “The Ellerman House Wine Gallery is a unique space where, through art, you get a very good understanding of the South African wine industry. For example, the corkscrew wine rack, made from carbon fibre and storing 1 500 bottles of our very best red wines. Or the Terroir Wall, which besides being an amazing work of art, you can see soil types of 100 different vineyards of the Cape, and this truly helps you to understand the wine in your glass.
“When it comes to the wine collection, it is a very good representation of South African wines of today and dates back to 1980.
“It is important to note that Ellerman House is a house and when you build a cellar for a house you collect wines for your pleasure and the future generations in the family – the tradition goes on and on, and that is the beauty about our collection.”
