My way
Lethukuthula Tshabangu knows the steps that led here were anything but cautious.
He admits, “I consider myself quite a reckless guy. I just follow my heart and I think it's quite dangerous, but that's what I do.”
It’s clear that Lethu is a risk-taker – brave, bold, original, and willing to stray far from the well-trodden path – but the roots of his love affair with beer were innocuous enough… “I was working as a bartender in a place that sells craft beer. I basically fell in love with beer and I wanted to learn more and more, each and every day.”
Before long, his home-brew hobby became a form of self expression. Lethu muses: “I fell in love with beer. I consider myself an artist, more like a liquid artist.”
Soon, Lethu recognised that with a little faith and a lot of heart, he could do something special – he could capture the spirit and personality of Africa in beer, as one of the only black brewers in the country.
He recalls, “I saw there was an opportunity for me to start my own brewery where I could make beer my way – which is more like trying to get beer as it is, modern beer, but like an African identity.”