Sophia Warner: Founder of Pebbles Project

Thursday, 5 August, 2021
Wines of South Africa, Angela Lloyd
The Pebbles Project is a well-known and admired NPO in the Cape Winelands and beyond. Possibly less widely known is Sophia Warner, the founder.

I have written about and supported Pebbles financially from the start and have great admiration for what Sophie (as she is known) has achieved; believing she deserves broader recognition, I chatted to her about the inspiration behind Pebbles, its goals, how it’s grown and some of her personal achievements.

‘My background is in Special Needs education and when I relocated from the UK to South Africa in 2003, I wanted to contribute to the upliftment of children here,’ Sophie tells me. ‘At the time, Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder was high profile in the media; South Africa being labelled FASD capital of the world. Then, the founding trustees were all involved in some way in the local wine industry; they realised the need to address challenges within farmworker communities, the lack of access to quality education in particular.’Pebbles was chosen as a neutral name not associated with any particular group. ‘Figuratively,’ she explains, ‘pebbles thrown in the water create ripples, like the impact Pebbles has on the life of each child, family or community.’

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