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The gigantic door at the front entrance is practically a sculpture, fashioned from metal with brass hinges, which owner Lukas van Niekerk, an engineer, manufactured on site while the house was being built. -
From the street-level gate by sculptor Conrad Hicks, stairs descend to the front door. -
A natural plant-filtered swimming pool is raised above ground level, partly in reference to agricultural reservoirs and partly to keep frogs from hopping in. -
The glass pavilions with “green fingers” between them knit the landscape and architecture together. -
Raised boardwalks wind through the naturalistic planting of local grassland. -
The powerful architectural concept of concrete walls, floors and ceilings is balanced by abundant art and sleek joinery. -
The bright colour and refined execution of the cabinetry in the kitchen is dramatically offset by the raw tactility of the concrete. Note the corner window inspired by Carlo Scarpa, one of Lukas’s favourite architects. -
The main living areas are high-ceilinged, open and expansive, furnished with a mismatched, eclectic selection of bright, characterful pieces. -
Covered outdoor areas, decks and raised walkways wrap around the house, creating subtle, graded transitions between indoors and out. The floors are cantilevered above the surrounding grassland to keep wildlife from straying inside. -
Raw steel rooftop edges have been deliberately allowed to rust and “bleed” on the concrete, expressing the effects of time and the weather. -
From a distance, the house all but disappears into the landscape. -
It is clear how the landscaping is woven into and between the architecture. -
Planted rooftops mimic the vegetation that would have covered the site before the house was built. -
A central gravel-covered courtyard creates a sanctuary at the heart of the home. -
In the courtyard, Lukas constructed a washing line that repurposes glass pylon insulators in an ongoing dialogue between architecture, engineering and art. -
The detailing on the outdoor staircase adds an organic delicacy to the steel, while all around plants grow on and over the house, as if reintegrating it into its setting. -
Protruding box windows are used to display art and objects, creating an outdoor gallery. -
Lukas’s workshop/studio/office. -
Salt and pepper grinders designed by Lukas. -
In the bedroom, floor-to-ceiling glass doors allow unobstructed views of the surrounding landscape. -
A glass-sided corridor creates the impression of being outside. -
Looking back at the house from the pool, it is apparent how its low-slung floating design is nestled in its setting. -
he minimalism of the master bathroom includes a polished concrete countertop in another variation of the expressive potential of the material, livened up with a bright yellow steel beam. The top corner of the shower features another cubic glass window à la Scarpa.
WORDS Graham Wood PHOTOS Dook PRODUCTION Annemarie Meintjes
The bold architecture and raw concrete finishes of this Monaghan farm house in the highveld make a surprisingly “gentle intervention in the environment”, as its architect puts it.
This house in Monaghan Farm in Lanseria, on a beautiful spot overlooking a bend in the Jukskei River, began with a bold, Brutalist architectural idea – but the result is an incredibly subtle, sensitive response to its setting. The owners, Wendy and Lukas van Niekerk wanted a home made entirely of steel and raw, exposed concrete, and this spectacular plot of land offered them the chance to build from scratch. Lukas, an engineer, is a huge fan of the work of 20th-century Italian architect Carlo Scarpa, who is famous for his sensitive use of concrete as well as experiments with concrete and steel – and the Van Niekerks’ architect, Enrico Daffonchio, went to school in Scarpa’s hometown of Venice in Italy. The fates had aligned.
Despite what Enrico refers to as its “strong architectural language”, the house they designed together is nestled into the landscape and, when viewed from higher up the hill, is practically invisible (helped by the green roofs planted with endemic grasses to recreate the landscape it’s built on). It is, quite literally, sunken into the landscape to keep its presence unobtrusive.
You descend from street level to the front door via steps that lead to a path through a courtyard. The bold simplicity of the forms – the slim, straight lines of the roof and overhangs – belie the complexity of the way the house is knitted into its setting, with courtyards and “green fingers” all around bringing the landscape and vegetation up to and between the rooms.
The design, which includes a main house and a cottage, is made up of a series of pavilions linked by a glass passageway. Enrico explains that this approach creates “nuanced transitions between inside and outside” – and, as he puts it, “degrees of insideness and outsideness”. Cantilevered decks around the house, floating above the landscape, are a clever device that prevents the wildlife (read: frogs and snakes) from sneaking in, so the doors can be left open. This further blurs the boundary between inside and out, as do the strategically placed cubic glass corner windows à la Scarpa.
From the concrete cocoon of the more private spaces, there are transitions to voluminous interior areas with vast floor-to-ceiling windows, the entrance “gallery” and rooms that open onto courtyards or a covered deck, and onto outdoor spaces that feel like exterior, walled-in rooms themselves. There’s an outdoor bathroom, open to the sky. “You’re inside, but you’re outside,” says Enrico. “You’re protected, but you’ve got the view.”
The architecture itself plays out in a game of contrasts between natural and artificial, building and landscape. The delicate wood-grain pattern of the shutter boards imprinted on the concrete has left a beautiful natural motif on the most artificial of materials. The steel, which has been deliberately allowed to rust, is, as Wendy puts it, “bleeding into the concrete”, creating an awareness of the passage of time and a sense of belonging. Inside, the raw concrete is offset by slick, refined joinery, which seems to emphasise the beauty of its textures. Lukas also made provision for several forward-thinking sustainable features at the time of construction, such as the pellet-boiler for the underfloor heating that not only keeps the interiors comfortable, but also ensures that the comfort is in tune with the home’s respect for the environment.
For Lukas, who was incredibly hands-on during the building process, the house continues to elicit a creative response. He and Wendy tinker endlessly with the landscaping and planting, and Lukas keeps adding architectural details throughout, combining engineering, architecture and sculpture. From one of the first details – the steel front door with its massive brass hinges that were milled on-site – to more recent additions such as the glass pylon insulators used on the washing line, the Van Niekerks’ home continues to evolve. Certainly, it’s a building with a big idea and a complex response to its setting – but it’s also deeply personal. “It’s not just a house,” says Lukas. “It’s an expression of who we are.”
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