- Architectural Design
Cape Town, “the Mother City” home to the Table Mountain, beautiful beaches, great wine farms, shark-cage diving, and world-class hiking. The top South African travel destination, with 9 of the ten spots in Tripadvisor’s list of the ten places to visit in South Africa, no wonder it’s at the centre of architectural design developments: everyone wants to get their little piece out of Cape Town.
Exciting sustainable development plans ahead
The final phase of the V&A Waterfront’s sustainable project the Silo District is set to be completed in 2017. The district is already home to award-winning buildings. New developments in the area, include corporate offices, a Virgin Active Health Club, an international branded hotel and parking bay to fit a thousand cars. The Waterfront’s CEO David Green said, “the intention is to create a vibrant and mixed-use sustainable district with sustainability credentials that will offer business opportunities, accommodation, lifestyle options and eateries.”
The new developments will sit on top of the parking bay and will house a sea cooling plant, sprinkler tanks, back-up generators and diesel storage. This district will offer tenants great savings in the long run and is firmly at the forefront of Cape Town’s architectural design and development, giving this harsh economy a little boost.
Revamping old buildings to turn them into something spectacular
Cape Town is no stranger to taking old buildings and turning them into masterpieces. The Chevron building in Foreshore is been turned into the new TakeAlot.com Headquarters and it looks stunning, treating your eyes as your drive past the building on the main road.
Also recently revamped, the old Standard Bank building which dates back to 1880 will house the new Cape Town Museum, that will, according to the Western Cape Government, “Reflect the diverse heritage of all the people of Cape Town.”
And the hits keep on coming
Thomas Heatherwick has revealed his plans to turn the old grain silo at the V&A Waterfront into the Zeitz Contemporary African Art (Zeitz MoCAA) this year. The 1920s building is made of forty-two concrete cylinders. Heatherwick plans to carve out eight of these to form a light-filled atrium. Most of the industrial machinery, left since the silo’s closure in the 1900s, Heatherwick will keep to create an industrial interior design look.
What to do with Cape Town’s unfinished highway
Many would call the famous unfinished highway an eyesore, but I think it’s iconic to the city. When people visit Cape Town it’s something they want to see, or at least get a little excited about when driving past on the highway. It’s proof that no one’s perfect, but sometimes messes can be beautiful.
There’s a rumor going around of plans to transform the unfinished bridge into a ramp with a parking lot, creating in my mind an architectural design wonder of skater’s dreams. Whether this idea will amount to anything or not remains to be seen as students from the UCT’s Architecture Department are tasked with figuring it out.
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