Latest news with #SpierArtsTrust
Time Out
05-06-2025
- Time Out
Spier Hotel's luxe glow-up is worth extending your stay for
Founded in 1692, all South Africans know Spier, usually thanks to the bottle of wine you take to your friends. For those who've visited in the last decade or so, the association is likely the conferencing element, the cheetah encounter experience or the birds of prey. None of those are available anymore (except good wine, still plenty of that) as Spier embraces a revamp that, frankly, feels more like a rebirth. The vibe is country but classic The new hotel resembles nothing of its former conferencing fame. Their 155 rooms were transformed into a boutique hotel with 80 rooms. The hotel is more of a retreat with endemic flora along paths that connect the various Cape terraced buildings. Every room and suite has a scenic view, whether it's the river, the gardens or the mountains. If you're looking for a space to touch grass, this is it. From using plants propagated on the farm to the repurposing of tables and lamp bases from the previous furnishings, the carbon impact of the revamp was carefully considered. Rooms exude effortless elegance with simplistic design. Luxurious touches feel like home, but better: think Karoo wool carpets, solid oak floors and silk linen and cotton textures. The details make the difference I usually leave minibars as I find them. Not here. They're crammed with Spier's award-winning wines, beers, soft drinks, iced tea and all the good stuff: white chocolate honeycomb, salted caramel marshmallow bars, roasted nuts and biltong - all included in your rate. It's the little touches, like the pot of honey and a fresh lemon beside the loose leaf rooibos tea grown on the farm, or the heated floors in the bathroom. Tempting as it is to become one with your fireside couch, wine in hand, I'd encourage you to venture out. Over 1,000 artworks from the Spier Arts Trust sprawl across the estate in rooms, restaurants and gardens. Provided you haven't enjoyed your minibar too thoroughly, you can hop on a Segway for a vineyard tour or join Farmer Angus and his chickens. The real magic is tasting that 'farm-fresh' difference. The pasteis de nata are the best I've had in South Africa, a claim I verified through daily samples. Eggs are indeed a popular choice on the breakfast a la carte menu, though you can help yourself to pastries, cured ham, smoked salmon and fruit from the harvest table. Eat (and drink) your way around the farm Other dining options include dinner at the spacious Veld with an open kitchen and massive artworks adorning the walls (senior wine educator Tyson Meyi is on hand with a warm smile and a pairing recommendation), or go for something more casual at Vadas Smokehouse and Bakery. There's also Bubbles and Braai or the Picnickery, where you can pre-order your basket before choosing a lakeside spot to set up your supplied blankets and backrests. I'm on the side of 30 where birdwatching is a thing, so I admired the purple herons and malachite sunbirds flitting around. A full day of farm exploring is best ended with a glass of Spier's 21 Gables Chenin Blanc, enjoyed around the fire pit on the rooftop bar with a gorgeous view of the sunset tinting the Helderberg mountains. If you're inclined, a bougie celebration can be organised in the Manor House, where Chef Hennie will come up with a special menu for your nearest and dearest in the original farmhouse buildings. Using the ground for good Feeling like a veritable Anne of Green (21?) Gables, I wandered around the apothecary garden with Dr Caren Hauptfleisch, the resident phytotherapist and then experienced the benefits of the homegrown herbs during Spier's signature Cape Herbal Bathhouse treatment, which involved becoming a human teabag. I was exfoliated on a heated marble slab, wrapped in linen for a herbal soak, and then massaged from head to toe. Spier's regenerative practices go beyond buzzwords: their water is 100% recycled and they send zero waste to landfill. Exploring the farm gives insights into these practices, even down to a free-choice mineral lick available to the cattle (not you… you get a custard tart instead). The livestock are also frequently moved to assist with carbon sequestration, and if you have no idea what that is, Angus will be so glad you asked. Spier's long-term community commitment is also evidenced in its Growing For Good initiatives, like projects to reduce youth unemployment and boost entrepreneur development, as well as Living Soils, dedicated to producing a new generation of regenerative farmers and Tree-preneurs, where community members learn how to grow trees from seeds which are then traded for vouchers for essential items. Long story short: your stay helps these projects thrive. Cheers to that. Child-friendly fun means more grown-up time If you've got kids, you're in for a treat. There's an Elemental Garden, open to all visitors, where play means hiding in the reeds, skidding down stone slides, and clambering rope bridges. Hotel guests with children get the perks of the Buzz Club, a programme with multiple daily activities centred around nature, like building bug hotels, making flower crowns, petal perfumes, painting and baking. And their parents get to enjoy everything else, like the heated pool. If your last visit to Spier was a few years back or involved a conferencing lanyard, it's about time you paid them a visit. Bring the family, stay a week and use Spier as a base to explore the Winelands and Cape Town. That is, if you can bear to leave the farm.
Time Out
30-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Spier unveils striking new arts exhibition
Aside from a chic new hotel, elegant country picnics, world-class wines, and a manicured estate that begs to be explored… if you needed another reason to visit Spier Wine Farm outside Stellenbosch, we've got one for you. Now open in the historic Old Wine Cellar of this rejuvenated Stellenbosch estate, Grounded Practice is a brand-new exhibition by Tamlin Blake, Chief Curator of the Spier Arts Trust, who has brought together 63 works by 42 South African artists. More than just a beautiful collection of ceramics, it's intended as a timely reflection on balance, belonging and our bond with the earth. Leaving the theme open-ended, Blake allowed the work of the collected artists to emerge organically. 'What came through, almost overwhelmingly, was a sense of instability – personally, politically, environmentally,' explains Blake. 'Many artists were using their practice to find their footing again, to reestablish a sense of balance and belonging. That's where the title 'Grounded Practice' comes from.' At the heart of the exhibition is clay, a central aspect of the estate's own terroir, and one of the world's oldest art materials. 'Clay is a potent and enduring material in human civilisation,' says Blake. 'It's often seen as a metaphor for creativity, malleability, and human potential. But once it's fired and becomes ceramic, it also represents permanence and resilience.' On display are works that range from bold and conceptual to playful and tactile, with something for art collectors and casual browsers alike. Highlights include Sinethemba Xola's spiritually infused vessels, Anita Sikutshwa's abstract forms drawn from African mythology, and Sylvester Mqeku's haunting sand-cast ceramics. 'Ceramics often don't get the spotlight they deserve,' says Blake. 'This show is a celebration of just how innovative, thoughtful, and beautiful the art form can be.' Best of all? Entry to 'Grounded Practice' is free.
The Guardian
19-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Peri-peri patron: how Nando's amassed a huge collection of South African art
On a weekday lunchtime the Nando's restaurant in Maponya Mall in Soweto, the sprawling former Black township on Johannesburg's outskirts, was busy with couples, white-collar workers and older women dining alone. Behind them, a vivid graffiti portrait of a young Black woman filled the wall. The mural, by the Cape Town artist Kilmany-Jo Liversage, is part of one of the largest private art collections in the world and, its curators believe, potentially the largest on public display. Nando's has been buying South African art to display in its peri-peri chicken restaurants globally since 2004, amassing a collection of about 32,000 pieces from 700 artists and becoming one of the country's most significant supporters of visual artists. 'They're like a parent to me,' said Liversage, who has created more than 10 murals for restaurants from Chicago to Dubai and sells one or two of her bright, spray-painted portraits of women to the company every few months. The chain was founded in Johannesburg in 1987 by Fernando Duarte and Robbie Brozin. The idea to start buying art came from Dick Enthoven, an insurance magnate who bankrolled the international expansion and came to own the chain. Nando's did not respond to questions, including whether the family of Enthoven, who died in 2022, still owns the private chain. Mirna Wessels, the chief executive of Spier Arts Trust, a non-profit that sources pieces for the Enthovens' private collection and businesses, said: 'It was a little challenging in the beginning … a lot of those hardy chicken and chips guys just didn't understand why they would now have to include fine art on the walls. 'But now I'm very comfortable and sure that it's part of their DNA.' Diana Hyslop, who started painting in the 1990s after a stint drawing for Marvel Comics in London, said Enthoven was one of the 'visionaries' who had had the biggest impact on her career. Hyslop, 75, who has sold about 250 of her magical realist works to Nando's, said: 'Dick bought a couple of pictures from the beginning … It's been fantastic, very generous.' Nando's, which has more than 1,200 restaurants in more than 20 countries, also runs the 'Creative Block' programme, giving artists 18cm or 30cm square wooden blocks to work on and providing personalised feedback. Then, three to four times a year in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Gqeberha, artists can submit work for the Spier Arts Trust to select and present in turn to Nando's executives. The company has a separate mentorship scheme for furniture and lighting designers. Over seven years, 70 designers had sold 65,000 pieces worth 200m rand (£8m) to Nando's restaurants, said Tracy Lynch, whose agency Clout/SA administers the programme. Wessels said Nando's bought about 2,000 works a year from 280 different artists, but would not share how much was spent, or the collection's value. Tamlin Blake, the Spier Art Trust's chief curator and a tapestry artist, said that in order to be considered for purchase, artworks had to be family-friendly, about 1 metre by 1.5 metres, and not behind glass. 'I do believe if the work is authentic and has something to say and is beautifully made, there will be a space for it somewhere,' she said. Kagiso Patrick Mautloa, 73, who creates everything from sculptures to mixed-media pieces, said the relationship gave him freedom: 'I put more of myself into the work.' Wessels said relationships were key: 'We just continuously run our career development programme, where artists are introduced to us. Tamlin will review and decide if an artist is serious about building an art career and has something unique to bring to table.' Anastasia Pather, who fingerpaints bright abstract pieces at her home studio in Johannesburg, said Nando's had been buying her work since she first started exhibiting. The 37-year-old, who was part of a Nando's exhibition in Dallas, Atlanta and now New Orleans, said: 'If you have some assurance that there is a more consistent patron of your work, you can take a few more risks in your pieces … I just wouldn't be able to be a full-time artist.' Vivien Kohler, whose works include everyday 'found' objects such as street signs, said the art world's elitism had initially shocked him: 'I hated that. So my MO from then on was always accessibility … to allow the ordinary viewer to appreciate art. So for me, it's brilliant, it's perfect.'
