Project Location: Pretoria 

Project Focus Area: Alternative Building Technology 

Supervisor(s): Dr Corallie van Reenen

Project Description: 

The fabric of existing neighbourhoods are increasingly being changed to include more economic enterprises. The older areas of suburbia have largely been left unchanged, as an area of low-density with homogenised activities. The existing traditional housing lexicon consists of a single-family house encircled by an imposing boundary wall. This planning framework is a remnant of the dating back to the colonial 1900s. Contemporary society and planners have started to densify suburbia throughout the country. Each process of densification occurs in isolation, focusing solely on the individual erf and designing it inwards towards the centre of the erf. The houses’ backs are turned to the street and the communal living environments are not in great supply. As a result big, corporate housing developments occur readily within new and older suburban areas and create housing en masse that has little variety and neighbourhood character. The result is an alienating neighbourhood for inhabitants as the buildings are “isolated architectural events.” The problem needing to be solved is how to bring about a return to the “health of village life,” characterised by a connection to nature and living in relation to neighbours while incorporating the benefits of living within proximity of city-life.

The requirement is that we “must plan the present area” to ensure that enrichment throughout is achieved without losing or sacrificing the existing socio-economic capital. This approach “relies on a symbiosis of existing conditions, philosophies, and thought processes” and nouveau strategies resulting in an “authentic place-specific expression.” The new living patterns contribute “to the South African city, which is defined not only by spatial dichotomies, but by social, cultural, political, and economic contrasts. “A generative ‘patterned language’ is sought (derived from Christopher Alexander’s ideology) which would not only allow the community to engage in the design process but would also generate design and planning alternatives which respect the existing context.

The proposed project explores the opportunity for a designed network of small business interventions and residential typologies of varied sizes along a green pedestrian corridor within residential suburbia.