When you have been in the travel industry for long enough, you begin to understand the importance of family businesses supporting family businesses. We may not always have the reach, resources or PR clout of the great corporate hotel groups and global brands. What we do have is something different: independence, long memories, deeply held values, and families willing to keep showing up for the places and people they love.

One of the great privileges of Londolozi’s hundred-year journey has been meeting other family businesses around the world doing exceptional things. Over the years, we have traded ideas around dinner tables, shared guests and stories, opened doors for one another, celebrated successes and stood alongside each other through the inevitable ups and downs of building something across generations.

There is a particular kind of understanding between family businesses. You know that behind the name on the gate are real people. Parents and children. Brothers and sisters. Generations who have inherited not only a business, but a responsibility to carry something forward.

And in our centenary year, we have found ourselves celebrating many of these friendships. One of them belongs to the Jordan family.

The Jordan family

Gary and Kathy Jordan established Jordan Wine Estate in Stellenbosch, South Africa, building a family business rooted in wine, hospitality, conservation and a deep respect for the natural environment.

Today, Gary and Kathy continue to work alongside the next generation. Their son Alex is an integral part of Jordan Wine Estate in South Africa, while their daughter Christy has taken the family’s pioneering spirit to England, establishing Mousehall, a distillery and winery in the Sussex countryside.

In many ways, it is a story we understand well.

The Varty family has been at the heart of Londolozi for a century. Founded in 1926 on the banks of the Sand River, Londolozi has grown from a remote wilderness camp into one of South Africa’s most renowned private safari lodges, always built around a deep connection to nature, conservation, people and exceptional hospitality.

Today, Dave and Shan Varty continue that legacy alongside their children, Bronwyn and Boyd, each playing their own part in the ongoing story of Londolozi. Together with the wider Londolozi family, they remain custodians of the land – carrying forward generations of connection to its wilderness, wildlife and people, while continuing to shape its future.

But the relationship between these two families did not begin in a boardroom or through a business deal.

It began at Londolozi.

Where the story began

In January 2017, Alex and Christy Jordan arrived at Londolozi Game Reserve in the Sabi Sands, South Africa.

Christy joined as a Camp Manager, while Alex became a Guide, taking phenomenal photographs and wonderful writer contibuting to our blog. Over the years that followed, Londolozi became much more than a place of work. It was a place where their shared love of nature and the outdoors found deeper meaning. Where hospitality was inseparable from the landscape around them. Where every day brought a greater appreciation for the delicate relationship between people, wildlife and the land.

And perhaps most importantly, it was a place where they experienced the meaning of family in a way that went beyond blood.

One of Alex Jordan’s incredible capture and edit of a leopard in a tree

Londolozi has always had a unique sense of family. It has been built through generations of people sharing the same landscape, the same values and the same responsibility to protect it. It exists in the relationships between guests and staff, between generations of the family, and in the enduring connection between people and the land itself.

As so often happens here, colleagues became friends and friends became family.

That sense of family spirit stayed with Alex and Christy long after they left Londolozi. And the friendship between our families continued — across South Africa and England, across businesses and generations.

Family spirit

There is also a rather wonderful piece of symmetry to this story. Londolozi was born, in part, over a game of tennis and a G&T. But that’s a story you can get into here…

What began as a conversation would eventually grow into the Londolozi of today. Almost a century later, gin has once again brought these stories together.

As Londolozi approached its 100th anniversary, the idea emerged to create a gin to mark the occasion – something that could celebrate our history, our people and the spirit of this place, while also honouring one of the enduring family friendships that has grown out of Londolozi’s journey.

To order Mousehall Gin with our 100th label on it, email Christy Jordan here.

The gin was created at Mousehall in Sussex, bringing together Christy’s distilling expertise and the Jordan family’s connection to Londolozi. This refreshing gin is smooth and full-bodied on the tongue. Flavours transition from classic juniper, zesty lemon/citrus, and subtle vanilla-like sweetness from the rooibos into a warming, spicy layer of cardamom. To order Mousehall Gin with our 100th label on it, email Christy Jordan here.

Jordan Wine Estate then brought the spirit back to South Africa, while Londolozi welcomed it home as part of our centenary celebrations –  a bottle of each that has adorned every sunset drinks stop this year as well as the launch event of The Safari that Changed Everything Assouline Book in London – a reminder that Londolozi is about family, first and foremost.

And so, in one bottle, three places, two families and two continents meet.

From the untamed wilderness of Londolozi, to the vineyard traditions of Jordan Wine Estate, to the artisanal craft of Mousehall, three stories are bound together by heritage, friendship and a shared belief in caring for the places we have been entrusted with.

But perhaps this gin celebrates something even larger.

It celebrates the power of family businesses to support one another, just as we’ve seen with our friends from Ardmore and the Joinery.

To trade ideas. To share opportunities. To open doors. To learn from each other. To stand alongside one another through the highs and lows. And, perhaps most importantly, to remind each other that building something for the next generation is never only about business.

It is about stewardship.

It is about relationship.

It is about investing in people, protecting fragile landscapes and carrying forward something that matters.

After one hundred years, Londolozi knows that legacy is rarely built in isolation.

It is built through the people we meet along the way.

Through friendships that endure.

Through families supporting families.

And every now and then, through a very good G&T and sunset!

A distillation of kindred spirits, shaped by legacy.

Honouring 100 years of family spirit.