Mahalia Kotjane's passion for wine stems from an unlikely beginning: a school project on microorganisms where she researched the role yeast plays in the fermentation process. That early curiosity sparked a journey that would take her from a township in Johannesburg to the vineyards of the Western Cape, where she studied agriculture before landing her first job in the wine industry in 2011.

Roles as a winemaker at Stark-Condé and Lievland Family Wines honed Mahalia's skills and deepened her understanding of South African terroir. With the confidence and expertise gained from years of hands-on winemaking, she decided to venture out on her own under her own Black-female-owned label, Three Quarters, a name that nods to her order of birth among her siblings.

Her maiden release was a Syrah, the first varietal she produced as a student, and a full-circle moment in her winemaking journey. Mahalia believes in the role that weather, terroir and the creative process play in crafting wine, and she creates each bottle with as little intervention as possible. Three Quarters represents a deeply personal expression of place, passion and possibility in the new South African wine landscape.