Three wines in SAWi's Grand Wines Collection 2020

Q&A conducted by Ed Beukes with Izak Smit, SAWi Project Director

In 2020, Du Toitskloof Red Muscadel is awarded Platinum (95+ points) with Land’s End Sauvignon Blanc and Syrah awarded Grand Gold (93+ points) for maintaining a standard of excellence over 10 years.

Ed: Izak, who is SAWi in one sentence?

Izak: SAWi is short for South African Wine Index, a private and independent wine quality monitoring authority applying a multi-vintage methodology with the aim of identifying South Africa’s best wines.

Ed: What is the essence of the process?

Izak: We have collated wine results with scores of 93 points and above from more than 100 multi-national blind tasting contests for more than 5 000 wines - The backbone is to select results above a mere gold award. That we did for the last 10 wine vintages which brought us to the end of the first phase of our endeavours.

Ed: Great, what’s the next phase?

Izak: Well Ed, what we have set out to do from the start, and that is to create an objective tool that classifies what ‘fine wines’ in South Africa look like and make it known to the public. The outcome is called the ‘Grand Wines Collection SA’.

Ed: And that’s where some of the wines that Du Toitskloof produces come in, right?

Izak: Correct, Du Toitskloof Red Muscadel has fulfilled the criteria and been awarded Platinum status with a score of 97. This wine is currently classified as the 3rd best in South Africa whilst both Land’s End Sauvignon Blanc and Land’s End Syrah was taken up in the GWC as Grand Gold achievers, showing consistent scores of 93+ over a period of 10 years. While these wines have built up a reputation as being amongst the best in the area, it can now stand its ground amongst all-comers countrywide too.   

Ed: How exactly does the SAWi system work, do you filter a wine through the system which kicks out a score based on data pulled over 10 years or has the system been collecting data every year for the last decade?

Izak: Both, with annual updates within a 10-year roll-over system. That means that with each new vintage added, the first will fall away. So, the current window for white wines is 2010 to 2019 and for red wine from 2007 to 2016. 

Ed: So the public can identify SAWi by means of two seals, SAWi Grand Gold (93+) and SAWi Platinum (95+). Tell us more about the definitive Fine Wine Guide.

Izak: The Fine Wine Guide both in print and digital versions, features South African wines that have been announced as being part of the ‘Grand Wines Collection’ based on pure excellence over multi-vintages. The collection includes just over 400 wines or 5.3% of all bottled wines from 140 wineries. Furthermore, the 50 wines with the highest scores are referred to as the ‘SAWi Ambassadors Club’. Wines that were added in 2020 will only feature in Edition II.

Purchase SAWi’s Fine Wine Guide or learn more about SAWi by clicking here.