The vineyards for the grapes of The Harp Red Blend 2017 are nestled in the coastal area of Stellenbosch, where the cool southerly summer sea breezes from False Bay bring balance and finesse. The Cabernet Sauvignon vineyard is on the southwest-facing slope of the Simonsberg Mountains, where cooler temperature slows the ripening process, allowing extended hang time and intensifying flavour. The Merlot and Petit Verdot are grown on the lower, mineral-rich slopes of the Helderberg Mountains, contributing depth and complexity to the blend.

The Cabernet Sauvignon grapes were harvested the last week of February and first week of March; the Merlot was harvested the last week of February and the Petit Verdot the first week of March.

The grapes were hand-harvested into lug baskets (±18 kg per basket), and meticulously sorted before destemming, then hand-sorted again between the destemmer and crusher. About half of the berries were left whole during crushing and then transferred to open-top fermenters. During fermentation — which lasted 7 to 16 days on the skins — the must was manually punched down 4 to 6 times per day. After fermentation, the wine was drawn off and gently pressed in traditional wooden basket presses.

Careful barrel-to-barrel and barrel-to-tank racking was performed, without any filtration prior to bottling. The wine was refined using natural settling and racking alone — a slow and gentle process that avoids fining agents, centrifuges or filters, allowing the wine to express its character naturally.

The wine matured in individual French oak barrels, a proportion of first, second and third fill for over 28 months, allowing it to develop rich texture, complexity and depth, yet retaining its elegance and beauty.

The 7 barrels that were selected for this reserve wine were racked and blended into a stainless-steel tank. After a period of settling, the wine was racked again into stainless-steel bottling tanks, from where it flowed by gravity via a cartridge filter into the filler — a limited release of 2,014 bottles.