When international home improvement retail giants Leroy Merlin planned their sixth South African megastore at the Newmarket Lifestyle Centre in Johannesburg, the brief was clear: maintain the core corporate identity of the group’s standard GLA (general lease area) – a warm, recognizable and relevant wooden façade – adapted to the site’s specific location and layout.
The gracious Four Seasons Westcliff Hotel, perched on the leafy hillside of the posh Johannesburg suburb, is renowned for its panoramic views of the city’s colourful canopy of trees. Built in 1997 as a hillside haven with a nod to the city’s chic colonial heritage in soft pastel shades with masses of glass frontage (including a glass lift), the iconic complex features luxury suites set amidst manicured terraces and stone courtyards, shady pergolas and luscious landscaping.
The Muelmed Mediclinic in Pretoria is a multi-disciplinary hospital which opened the first private trauma unit in the city in 1993. The healthcare facility is renowned for its specialist medical care and management believed it was time to upgrade the late 70’s modernist or ‘brutalist’ concrete façade to reflect a softer, more caring, contemporary corporate image. Its heavy horizontal concrete structure with precast concrete stairways and balconies formed an oppressive façade that had started deteriorate and required urgent treatment for a refreshing facelift to redefine the organization’s identity.
The Black Bull Steakhouse is a striking A-frame dining establishment set to become an architectural landmark at the new Wood Drive Lifestyle Centre just north of Sunningdale, Cape Town. Wood Drive is a contemporary convenience centre –conceived by Garden Cities developers as an attractive, pedestrian-friendly facility to service the shopping and entertainment needs of the community while enhancing the natural surrounds. It forms part of the greater urban design framework linking the windy West Coast to the developing northern periphery of Cape Town.
Telecommunications giant, MTN is Africa’s largest mobile network operator providing voice, data and sophisticated ICT solutions to over 300 million subscribers. Purposefully set up to offer a modern, connected life, the company’s huge corporate infrastructure – from cellphone towers to fibre, data centres to cloud-based API offerings – is centrally controlled from their state-of-the-art campus in Fairlands, Johannesburg.
The Walter Sisulu University of Science and Technology was formed through the merger of the Border/Eastern Cape Technikon and the University of Transkei in July 2005, and comprises of four campuses situated in Umtata, Buffalo City (East London), Butterworth and Queenstown. Given the cultural heritage of the various campuses including traditional Xhosa villages coupled with the modern materiality of science and technology, the University aims to upgrade the various faculties into a single space, starting with the Engineering Faculty in East London.
The Highlands Golf Club in the Edmonton River valley boasts some of the best forest views and fairways in the region. Members not only enjoy a round of golf in the gorgeous natural surroundings for three seasons of the year, but many locals also walk the trails with their pets during the winter or enjoy the warm hospitality at the clubhouse.
The new Marillac Health clinic (now known as PrimeHealth Plus) in Grand Junction, Colorado, is a 27,000 square feet community-based medical facility offering integrated healthcare services including medical, dental, behavioural and dispensary solutions all under one roof. Comprising 24 medical exam rooms, 16 dental operatories and five behavioural counselling centres, as well as a drive-through pharmacy, the new complex services a broad cross-section of patients from the Mesa and Montrose counties regardless of their ability to pay.
Modern malls and shopping centres are mushrooming in nearly every neighbourhood with competition for consumers’ spending at an all-time high. No longer just a place to purchase groceries, pay bills and fill prescriptions, contemporary centres must provide a balanced mix of chic convenience coupled with stylish lifestyle solutions or risk losing patronage to nearby competitors. They must appeal to both residents and retailers.
Rising building material and labour costs, and time and space constraints, place increased pressure on urban planners and developers to meet the demand for urbanization, housing and infrastructure. Long, expensive and often delayed construction periods and inadequate facilities have a massive social and economic impact on the quality of life of citizens, and the businesses that service them. Architects and town planners must engineer a viable, sustainable society with attractive, adaptable and functional buildings that balance expansion, budget and time restrictions, as well as climate considerations.
