SHAPE SHIFTER
A light-filled family home designed by a renowned local architect celebrates its modernist heritage with a sensitive restoration and mix of hand-picked vintage finds and contemporary interpretations.
A light-filled family home designed by a renowned local architect celebrates its modernist heritage with a sensitive restoration and a mix of vintage finds and contemporary interpretations.
Renovating an iconic home comes with a responsibility to honour the past without compromising one’s own vision for it. Homeowners Michael and Claire Cobbledick couldn’t resist the 1970s house designed by a renowned local architect when they stumbled on it – even though it didn’t tick the boxes of a family home at first sight.
“It was an entirely emotional decision. We knew we wanted it as soon as we walked in. It felt completely welcoming, somehow familiar; reminding me of certain modernist houses, yet entirely singular with its bold, geometric aesthetics,” says Michael.
The rooms’ sense of connectedness and the house’s relationship to the striking garden that resonated with them was no accident. Designed by the architect as his family home and as a series of experimental dwellings he was working on at the time, it reflects the particular design commandments he was exploring as a private research project.
It was built to accommodate the landscape – the garden’s natural slope – inspiring the design rather than fighting it. This resulted in a three-level creation of layered, connected rooms. The ‘pinwheel’ configuration placed the living room at the centre, inspired by Japanese architecture.
Every room was defined by a consistent grid of squares modelled on the 3.5m x 3.5m proportions of a tatami room. Drawing on African spacial development, the courtyards are placed on the outside, with a fixed core for the general family activities, expanding outwards, like a village.
A DESIGN CHALLENGE
“We wanted to retain the essential character of the original design intent,” says architect Martin Kruger. “The clients wanted to improve and update the kitchen and bathrooms without losing the modernist qualities.”
The original design challenged many norms of the time, he explains, with windows built directly into walls, the use of Georgian glass, and aluminium shutters availed as sun protection.
They approached the project more as a restoration than a renovation, choosing to retain the existing white bagged walls, black steel frames of doors and windows, and original glazed brick flooring used throughout. The principal changes they made removed all of the old
“IT DIDN’T TICK THE BOXES OF A FAMILY HOME AT FIRST SIGHT.”
“MULTIPLE SKYLIGHTS AND WINDOWS CREATE A KALEIDOSCOPE OF ENTRY POINTS FOR LIGHT.”
joinery, taking out room dividers, streamlining the kitchen and stripping back redundant features.
Respecting the journey from the entrance – emphasised by a quirky, round doorway – to the heart of the house was a priority, explains Michael. Now enclosed by a new courtyard, privacy was no longer a concern, so they replaced the fibreglass panes with glass, bringing additional light into the kitchen areas and the TV room, which was previously used as a study.
Stepping up from this entrance level into the home’s centre simulates a cathedral-like experience. The ‘auditorium’ (the current lounge and dining space) doubled as a space to watch movies on a motorised projector screen, cutting-edge in its heyday. High ceilings, a wall of glass, and multiple skylights and windows in various shapes and sizes create a kaleidoscope of entry points for light. The room, with its recessed and overlapping arches and a central fireplace, is a fascinating architectural achievement. “The series of overlapping planes allows natural light into the spaces between circular arches. We enhanced this with new lighting and kept the natural skylight intact,” says Martin.
The auditorium precinct spills onto the garden, another arresting selling point that seduced the couple. The original garden too was typically modernist with Japanese and Eastern influences, explains Michael. However, presented with the mature garden, which had evolved into an unpenetrable forest, they chose to remove specific non-local trees and cleared shrubbery to reclaim it.
The property is nestled below Table Mountain overlooking Cape Town, with a perennial river running through it. On the bank, an ancient
Clockwise from above, left: The main bedroom was positioned so the oak tree in the garden dominates the view; In the main ensuite bathroom, moss-green walls and a skylight create a sensation of being in a horticultural glasshouse; The house is designed to connect in multiple ways to the garden; In the entrance hall, the homeowners replaced white timber ceilings with natural, unpainted timber. oak tree, embraced by masses of monstera vine, was the natural focal point for the home’s outlook. “When you look out of the window in the main bedroom and from the gallery of windows in the auditorium, there’s no doubt that they were very deliberately positioned, so the oak dominates the views,” says Michael.
PERSPECTIVES & ANGLES
The arches and the vaults over the bedrooms and kitchen are also based on the 3.5m grid, and that determines the size of the spaces. The master bedroom sits like a mezzanine, overlooking the auditorium and sons Tom’s and Leo’s bedrooms beyond. “I love the outlook from here,” says Michael. “There are so many perspectives and angles on the house, and from here you get a bird’s eye view, and you can take in all the features that the architect chose so carefully to include,” he says. With a nod to the tatami-inspired dimensions, the owners installed a contemporary take on the Shoji screen, giving them the option to screen their bedroom and upstairs pyjama lounge.
In the bathrooms, the primary palette used initially was translated into the introduction of matte orange taps and bold blue shades, expressed on the doors and with handmade ceramic tiles sourced for the showers. These pops of colour are echoed elsewhere – yellow tiles in the kitchen splashback and the upholstery of fitted seating. The ‘modern retro’ is celebrated with mid-century furnishings and balanced with the couple’s eclectic art choices and collected objects.
Virtually all the home’s original structural elements and details have been authentically retained with a thoughtful, new design layer implemented that opened the house up to the garden, says Martin. The result is a family home that makes a contemporary statement without losing its modernist soul.