Beau Constantia House 1

Situated on the urban edge of Constantia, this former livestock farm was redeveloped into a small scale wine farm, with a main residence and associated meditation pavilion as well as a guest cottage.

The residence and pavilion are arranged on an elongated platform tucked into a fold in the mountain, entirely isolated from the surrounding urban fabric but connected to expansive views of the landscape all round. The accommodation is organised around a system of outdoor courtyards, simultaneously shaping and being shaped by the building and arranged along an axis of movement linked to elements in the landscape beyond.

The physical and conceptual centre of the house is the double volume kitchen/ dining/ family room, the ‘heart of the house’, around which all the external courtyards and accommodation gravitate. The intention was to depart entirely from an architecture of punctured walls and attached roof, into another type of composition altogether – of floating elements, held together in a unified whole, entirely permeable to its surroundings.

Publications:

S.A Architect March/ April 2006
S.A Architect Sept./ Oct. 2006
Deckler T, Graupner A, Rasmuss H; Contemporary South African Architecture in a Landscape of Transition; Double Storey Books, Cape Town 2006
The Phaidon Atlas of 21st Century World Architecture, Phaidon Press, 2008                                                                                                                       Archinature; Vol 1, pg 204-223; Beta Plus, Italy 2010
Tolic, I; Contemporary Architecture South Africa; pg 76-79; Motta Architecttura, Italy 2010
Cape Town Architecture and Design; pg 110-119, daab, Czech Republic 2007
Home: New Directions in World Architecture; pg 182-186; Briza Publications & Millenium House, China 2006
Joubert, O (ed); 10 Years + 100 Buildings: Architecture in a Democratic South Africa; pg 324-327, Bell Roberts Publishing, South Africa 2009

Exhibitions:

Sharpcity exhibition at Sao Paulo Biennale, 2005

Awards:

Fulton Commendation for Excellence in the Use of Concrete – Aesthetic Appeal 2005
Cape Institute of Architects Award of Commendation 2005
South African Institute of Architects Award of Merit 2006
South African Institute of Architects Award for Excellence, 2006

Photography:

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