Pringle Bay Holiday Haven

WORDS Debbie Loots PRODUCTION Sumien Brink PHOTOS Lien Botha

For an adventurous couple who spent their vacations crisscrossing the globe, a one-spot holiday-stop seemed inconceivable. Until two little boys came along and the new family needed a sanctuary.

Kathinka and Pieter van Eeden never wanted a holiday home. In the years after their wedding these nature lovers were happy-go-lucky globetrotters. From the highest peaks in Patagonia to sea-level Sardinia in the Mediterranean, not to mention the very tip of the south of France, they soaked up the heady sights and sounds of foreign places.

Yet, through all of their adventures, the times they treasured most were the sense of quiet in places of worship – the monasteries, chapels and retreats. It was this feeling that Kathinka wanted to capture when she and Pieter decided to hang up their walking boots and build a holiday home – when their family of two became a family of four after their twin boys, Jan and Milan, were born.

Her small sons also sparked childhood memories for Kathinka, of her family home in Germany, special moments she wanted her sons to experience too.

So, with a holiday sanctuary agreed on, practicalities were next. The house had to be built on a plot not too far from Cape Town and it had to be done in an ecofriendly way, with solar panels for lighting, and gas for cooking and heating. Costs were also to be kept low.

They chose an erf in Pringle Bay minutes from the beach bustle yet tucked away among large trees and plants, and called  in architect Etienne Bruwer of Greenhaus Architects and builder Calvin Murphy.  Etienne had designed their home in Constantia 10 years before and, just like then, his understanding of their priorities and style, as well as his über-green credentials, spoke to their environmentally passionate hearts.

Etienne explains the economies of the design: “By using a long house or fisherman’s cottage as an archetype, the plan becomes extendable. The roof provides attic space, which can almost double the floor area, leaving the inside footprint small.”

North-facing windows maximise natural heating from the sun and offer protection from the southeaster. A front veranda enclosed by stable-like wooden doors, which can be completely closed off from the extended open stoep, further ward off the Cape’s weather volatilities.

Inside, all the walls are clad with a mixture of white cement and washed local sand. In the open-plan living, dining and kitchen area, the walls stretch up all the way into the two loft rooms on either side of the double- volume space. The expansiveness of the dune-coloured walls instills a sense of cool and calm, says Kathinka: “It’s soothing after a day in the glare of the sun and the sea. Like a chapel.”

The living area is flanked on both sides by contained units comprising two bedrooms, a bathroom and a loft room, accessible by a ladder. These separate spaces make it convenient for more than one family to stay over, while leaving the central living area for gathering, eating and socialising.

“The Van Eedens loathe ostentation; they value simplicity and quality, as is evident in their selection of a few special, functional items: a decent stove, heating plant and washable paints,” says Etienne “yet, nothing’s too precious for dogs, children and surfers.”

This minimalist approach is also clear in their decor choices, the extent of which entails a few small black candleholders on walls, and gatherings of felt rabbits on beds and tables, some disguised as tea cosies. The rabbits Kathinka collected from Karen Platje over the years who “has the most amazing felting studio in Stellenbosch”.

This sense of stripped quietness allows  for singular objects to come into their own, like the antique medicine cabinet Kathinka bought at Onsite Gallery in Cape Town, two felt lampshades in the dining area (from I Felt Like It) and a tiny wooden cupboard in a corner, rescued from her father-in-law’s garage. Two green vintage leather chairs perch proudly in the sunny lounge overlooking the Kogelberg Mountains, and burglar bars from Rust & Roses twine like leafy stencils across some of the windows.

Stepping outside, through the veranda’s stable doors, and on to the open front stoep, another rescue is found: an Indian daybed. It’s catching the breeze and the warm rays of the sun slowly setting behind the trees.

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