A COUP, NOT A CON
Cape Town’s WDC reign is a chance for designers to help fix the city’s broken soul,
FOR all Cape Town’s natural beauty, and for all the good intentions of many of its chi-chi citizens, its recent history is a tale of two cities, not one. There is no shortage of well-intentioned, creative projects aimed at easing Cape Town’s lack of social cohesion and its stubborn poverty, which seems to increase with every step you take away from the mountain.
But many of these efforts have precious little effect. Some might argue that the latest in this long list is the World Design Capital status, awarded to the city for 2014.
It’s understandable that WDC 2014 would come under scrutiny — as it did in Lin Sampson’s article last week in Lifestyle (“The Yellow Peril”).
Questions abound: Who is involved? Who will benefit? Is the city’s design community in touch with the needs of the populace beyond “oh-so-hip” artisanal coffee tables made from only invasive alien wood species?
What’s clear, though, is that the WDC title is not a stamp of approval on the city, signalling that it already represents all that is great about design in the world. Nor is it about finding the next Philippe Starck. Rather, it acknowledges a commitment to placing design at the centre of the social transformation that Cape Town so desperately needs.
Apartheid design was strategically geared to perpetuate segregation. The WDC status not only highlights that design history but also challenges the Cape Town design fraternity to help lead a reversal of its legacy.
On a quick read through the list of accredited projects, you’ll spot one too many hipster-iffic cycling-based initiatives. But the year will run its course. Some ideas will fade, some will shine. Alongside the more traditional design projects, the true beneficiaries will be pre-existing community-based design projects. Let’s not underestimate the value of good PR for them.
Zahira Asmal is the MD of Designing SouthAfrica, a nonprofit organisation that researches, showcases and supports design initiatives with a social emphasis.
Says Asmal: “Wallpaper and other magazines are asking questions about our projects in the city for WDC 2014, so it has great PR value, further improving support for the projects. Through this media attention, we’ve also been able to get government involved.”
Think of ongoing projects such as Make Content, a multidisciplinary design studio in Woodstock, that specialises in translating potentially heavy, boring content — think “Climate governance in Africa” — into simple, beautifully designed booklets that make knowledge consumption less of an effort.
Make Content’s involvement with WDC is to hold talks at high schools to expose kids to design-related industries.
Then there are projects like #WDC238: Re-blocking Mtshini Wam, in Milnerton’s Joe Slovo settlement, where an entire informal settlement was redesigned by its inhabitants to allow the City of Cape Town to deliver basic services and to minimise unwanted threats. Shacks were dismantled, upgraded and rebuilt all in one day. The redesign of the neighbourhood now allows easy access for emergency services.
There are many similar examples, including #WDC347 Ajuga’s fire-resistant structures to help people living in shacks, and plans for fireproof crèches.
It is these efforts that need the media attention, the public and government support. Let’s be honest, government officials do love a good photo op. It’s a dirty game, but some horses just have to be dragged to the water and force fed.
As for the cyclists, it should be mentioned that cities like London are not trying to get people to stop cycling — quite the contrary. Last month, London mayor Boris Johnson allocated a further £17-million to improving life for its cyclists by building more lanes and bike-parking spaces and providing training for truck and bus drivers on sharing roads with cyclists.
Cape Town, whatever some of its residents may think, is not Europe — but we can learn a few tricks from each other, and possibly even celebrate that long list of cycling projects.
Colwyn Elder, strategy director at ad agency Y&R, writes that the deciding factor that finally put Cape Town ahead of WDC 2014 rivals Bilbao and Dublin was “the promise to broaden the scope and shape of the initiative and thus design as a whole”. And if ever there was a city in dire need of having its design scope broadened, Cape Town is it.