Babylonstoren: a working farm stay in the Cape Winelands

We arrived late enough for the garden to have disappeared into the dark. After a wine tasting, we went back outside with a torch and walked between the fruit trees, trying to identify the fruit by taste. It was an entertainingly unreliable system and, as introductions go, a convincing one.

For me, this was a first visit. My husband had stayed at Babylonstoren on his first trip to South Africa, after a horseback safari near Kruger National Park, and was adamant that I had to experience it, too. So the farm became a fixed point in our January 2018 itinerary. By the end of the first evening, we were already eating our way through the garden.

Babylonstoren sits in Simondium, between the better-known wine towns of Stellenbosch and Franschhoek. Calling it a hotel gives only part of the picture. It is a historic Cape farm with orchards, vegetable beds, vineyards, restaurants, a cellar and cottages scattered through the working landscape. The garden connects them all.

A wooden crate holds citrus, carrots, leafy greens and herbs beside a Babylonstoren garden map. — Winter in the welcome crate, during my husband’s July stay.

A firelit Babylonstoren sitting room with white chairs, a hanging wicker chair and wooden floors. — A winter fire during my husband’s 2014 stay.

The white gabled Babel building behind low grey-green garden planting at Babylonstoren. — Babel during my husband’s 2014 stay.

A whitewashed Babylonstoren cottage with dark shutters, a curved chimney and firewood stacked beneath oak trees. — Our cottage under the oaks.

A dirt lane passes between whitewashed cottages and oak trees at Babylonstoren. — The cottages faced an unpaved farm lane.

A row of low white Babylonstoren cottages sits beyond a field with mountains in the distance. — From the fields, the hotel almost disappeared.

The cottage looked toward the garden

Our room was a whole cottage, with a fireplace, a summer kitchen and a terrace. Inside, white linen and pale walls made the older pieces stand out: a carved bench at the foot of the four-poster bed, botanical prints, dark window frames. The bathroom was more playful, with a freestanding bath and a grid of mirrors multiplying the room.

Wide view of a white four-poster bed, linen sofa and pale cupboards in a Babylonstoren cottage. — White walls, a four-poster bed, and the garden waiting outside.

A white four-poster bed, linen sofa and wooden fruit crate in a Babylonstoren cottage room. — The fruit crate sat between the bed and sofa.

Open white cupboards hold a robe and coffee tray beside the doorway to a Babylonstoren cottage bathroom. — A robe, a coffee tray, and the bathroom beyond.

I can spend an unreasonable amount of time inspecting small hotel details, and this cottage kept me busy. Yet the interior never closed in on itself. A wooden box of fruit and greenery beside the bed brought the farm indoors; the windows and terrace kept pulling my attention out again.

Four green rubber boots stand in a wicker basket inside a Babylonstoren cottage. — Boots ready for the farm.

A wooden Babylonstoren crate holds grapes, plums, an apple and greenery beside a wine glass. — January arrived in plums, grapes, and an apple.

The person behind this restraint was Karen Roos, the former editor of Elle Decoration South Africa and the co-founder and creative force behind the modern hotel. Roos and her husband, Koos Bekker, had first imagined the historic farm as a private weekend retreat and a setting for photography. Then the garden changed the plan.

In 2007, Roos commissioned French architect Patrice Taravella, whose work at the medieval-inspired Prieuré Notre-Dame d’Orsan she had admired. The brief for Babylonstoren was an edible and medicinal garden informed by the old Company’s Garden at the Cape, which once supplied passing ships. As the garden grew, so did the idea that other people should be able to live inside it. In a 2012 Forbes profile, Roos put the change plainly: “We needed to make it into a place people could share.”

Her magazine background is visible in the way Babylonstoren is composed. Roos told Architectural Digest that the early guest interiors were kept restrained so that no object would compete with the garden and mountains. Her restoration work could be painstaking. In the private Owners’ House, she supervised the removal of 23 layers of paint to find the original ochre colors, then had them matched and reinstated, according to The Observer.

A white freestanding bath, dark-framed window and geometric mirrored wall in a Babylonstoren cottage bathroom. — The bathroom allowed itself more fun.

That story explains why the property feels coherent without feeling themed. Roos edited the rooms, but she gave the garden the last word.

Breakfast, then breakfast again in the orchard

Morning began with bread from the oven, honey, herbs, vegetables and a table so abundant that breakfast could quietly take the place of lunch. The farm-to-table phrase is worn smooth by hotel menus; here I could follow the ingredients back outside.

A long Babylonstoren breakfast table is covered with bread, fruit, vegetables, cheese and charcuterie. — Breakfast, Babylonstoren style.

Bread, cheese, fruit, vegetables and charcuterie fill a Babylonstoren breakfast table. — There was no sensible place to begin.

My own ritual was to walk through the garden and collect whatever I could carry to the cottage. Nectarines and pears were ripe. There were quince, plums and figs, too. I brought them to the terrace and ate them slowly, without improving them in any way.

The garden was beautiful without being overly well behaved. Almond shells covered the paths. Guinea fowl hurried across them while tortoises moved at their own pace. There was a lotus pond, and bunches of grapes hung above the arbors.

The rest of the farm filled the day in the same unforced manner. We toured the growing areas, rode bicycles and went fishing on the property. During our stay, guests could visit the hens and gather eggs for breakfast. Near the vineyards and nectarine trees, rows of lavender changed the color of the farm; lavender and rosemary were used for oil there.

Green vineyard rows at Babylonstoren with cloud-capped Cape mountains beyond. — Vines below, mountains behind.

Olga walks away along a dirt path between vineyard rows at Babylonstoren. — Back toward the farm.

Olga walks between rows of purple lavender on the Babylonstoren farm. — A change of color near the vineyards.

These were activities, technically, but they did not feel like the familiar resort program printed to prevent boredom. One thing led to the next because it belonged to the same place: orchard to breakfast, hens to eggs, lavender to oil, grapes to the cellar.

The current hotel program still presents the farm in those terms. Breakfast and garden access are included for hotel guests, and the listed experiences range from garden and farm walks to bicycles, fishing, rowing, harvesting, bread baking and cellar visits. Some depend on the day, season or length of stay, so I would confirm the schedule when booking rather than arrive with a rigid list.

The wine belongs to the day

My husband is the wine person in our marriage, and he is often the reason a winery hotel enters our itinerary. My attention soon wanders beyond the glass. I want to know how the room, food and landscape fit around it. That curiosity has taken us to Atamisque in Mendoza, to Santa Rita in Chile and through Napa Valley. The latter two deserve stories of their own.

I am not a wine connoisseur, so I remember the setting rather than the technical character of a bottle. At Babylonstoren, wine appeared in a way I particularly enjoy: an easy tasting, a glass with lunch and afternoon drives to other estates. It belonged to the day rather than interrupting it.

Rosé, fruit, cheese, charcuterie and bread on a table overlooking vines at Babylonstoren. — Rosé and lunch among the vines.

Olga sits with wine and a fruit crate at a green table beside a cottage firewood niche. — Lunch outside the cottage.

Olga sits on a wooden Babylonstoren crate beside a wine-tasting sign and vineyard rows. — A short rest between vineyard rows.

Three plated dinner courses and a glass of white wine on a wooden table at Babylonstoren. — Dinner kept the garden on the plate.

Babylonstoren currently reports about 120 hectares under vine and 13 grape varieties. Those figures give the wine operation its proper scale, but the pleasure of staying on a wine farm cannot be reduced to statistics. The same land was present in the glass, on the breakfast table and beneath our bicycle wheels.

The farm and the wider Winelands

On the weekend days of our stay, many people came from the Cape for the garden, food, wine and shops. We could see that Babylonstoren was their country outing. The farm did not need the hotel to make it a destination.

Picnic tables and white umbrellas are set on the Babylonstoren hotel lawn beneath mature trees. — By evening, the lawn had become a dining room.

Hats, books and ceramics in a Babylonstoren shop with a black-and-white illustrated wall. — The shop had its own appetite for pattern.

That observation still matters when planning a stay. Babylonstoren welcomes day visitors, while hotel guests begin and end each day inside the farm. I would always protect enough time for an unhurried garden morning and an evening without an onward reservation.

The wider Winelands were part of our trip, too. We went to Franschhoek and Stellenbosch, and our afternoons included visits to other wineries. The routes below are how I would plan those drives now, pairing wine with art or a market instead of collecting unrelated stops. The distinctions are specific: some belong to a particular wine or year, others to the visitor experience.

Toward Franschhoek

A Franschhoek day can join wine and art without becoming a race. At Leeu Estates, Mullineux & Leeu Family Wines offers tastings in its Wine Studio; Wine & Spirits named Mullineux among its Top 100 Wineries in both 2019 and 2021. The estate also has an Everard Read gallery and sculpture program. Alternatively, visit the gallery’s Huguenot Road space in the village.

On a Saturday, the Franschhoek Village Market can anchor the morning, with local food, produce, craft and vintage stalls beneath the oaks. It is weather dependent, and the organizer publishes a weekly update, so check before driving.

Toward Stellenbosch

For a wine-led Stellenbosch day, Kanonkop is the focused choice for reds and Pinotage. Wine Spectator placed its 2008 Pinotage in the magazine’s 2010 Top 100 and scored the Paul Sauer 2018 at 93 points in 2022. Rust en Vrede is another serious red-wine estate, with its own history in the Wine Spectator Top 100 and a simple Winemaker’s Lunch that can keep the day from fragmenting into too many reservations.

For the combination that best suits my own interest in wine, art and landscape, I would choose Delaire Graff. It appeared at number 79 in the extended World’s Best Vineyards 2025 visitor ranking, and its collection and sculpture gardens turn the estate into more than a tasting stop. A dedicated art day could instead include the Rupert Museum or the seven-hectare Dylan Lewis Sculpture Garden, which is visited by appointment.

If the drive falls on a weekend, Blaauwklippen Family Market currently runs on Saturdays and Sundays. Opening days, appointments and tasting formats change more quickly than the vineyards, so every one of these practical details deserves a final check.

Above the farm

One evening, we borrowed bicycles and followed the farm tracks toward Koppie. We left the bikes below, found the path and climbed while the light dropped.

From the top, our cottage was one small white building among vineyards, orchards and fields. The mountains held the far edge of the view. Down below, the design details that had occupied me indoors disappeared into the scale of the farm.

Olga sits on a rock on Koppie as the sun sets over vineyard rows below. — Sunset above the vineyards.

A high view across vineyards and farm buildings toward mountains under a pink sunset sky. — The farm at the end of the day.

That is the view I remember when I think of Babylonstoren. I remember the beautiful room, certainly, and the breakfast table that seemed to contain half the garden. More than either, I remember living inside the connection between them.

My stay was in 2018, so this is not a current verdict on service or price. It is a first-person account of why Babylonstoren has remained on my list of hotels I would return to. Stay for the garden before the gates open and after the day visitors leave. The room is lovely. The privilege is time on the farm.