For the renovation of a 1960s home in the suburb of Rondebosch, Cape Town, architect and designer Hanno de Swardt of Onnah Design was tasked with creating flow and maximising the outdoor space for living and entertaining, while working within the compact site and existing footprint. 

Hanno’s approach was to open up the rooms, which were small, separate and oddly configured, address some “afterthought” additions, and ensure that the old tied in with the new, both structurally and aesthetically. The dramatic transformation was completed with stylish new fittings and finishes throughout and a modern palette.

Reconfiguring the entrance had a big impact on the home’s layout. “Previously one entered the house via an uninspiring paved courtyard through a sliding door directly into a small, dark lounge,” explains Hanno. He was able to “turn the house on its head” by creating a formal entranceway on the side of the property, accessed via a narrow walkway, an approach that affords an element of surprise as the home opens up to visitors.

To further distinguish the entrance, Hanno worked with the client on a statement wall in the lobby. They considered a few finishes – an accent colour, textured wallpaper, stone cladding – and settled on brickwork. The original intention was to whitewash the bagged brick, but the builder did such a skilled job with the brickwork that they decided to leave it raw and red.

The other major change was relocating the kitchen from the centre of the house to the side, freeing up central space for easy circulation and living. Now everything flows towards a plant-filled courtyard, where the addition of a pool links the all-weather enclosed braai room, one of Hanno’s favourite parts of the house.

“We’re bringing sexy back to the typical South African indoor braai room,” he laughs. “They’re traditionally associated with a thatched lapa, face brick or terracotta tiles. This braai room is a triumph – a celebration of a truly South African custom in a unique and stylish way.”

View more before-and-afters by Onnah Design here and find Hanno on Instagram (@onnah_design). 

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The annual KAMERS/Makers market experience, themed the Year Of The Open Hand, will take place from 28 February – 4 March 2018 at St Joseph’s Marist College in Rondebosch, Cape Town.

This year’s event will allow local design enthusiasts to shop items from more than 110 makers, from wine barrel furniture and handmade jewellery to wooden, porcelain and ceramic serving ware and hand-spun scarves.

Gourmet food forms an integral part of the festival, so expect an array of fresh and interesting dishes.

The event’s non-profit initiative Mzansi Makers kicked off last year with five successfully running projects, with another six scheduled and funded for this year.

Tickets are on sale now for R60 via plankton.mobi, otherwise tickets will cost R90 at the entrance. Students and pensioners pay R60, while those under 18 enter for free. Your ticket comes with a limited edition KAMERS/Makers shopper bag and magazine.

For more information, visit kamersvol.com.  

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Having moved into their Rondebosch home six years ago, a young couple knew they had a lot of work to do.

The space was homely, but in dire need of a revamp, from the dated facebrick facade to the impractical interiors. With a clear idea of what they wanted, the couple turned to architect and interior designer Hanno de Swardt of Onnah Design and contractor and project manager Mick Murphy of Murphy Projects.

“From day one, when introduced to the client, I sensed a lovely calmness,” says Hanno. “This was the main source of inspiration for me – to create a happy home for a lovely couple and their two labradors. A home that was calm and collected, both physically and visually, a living environment that was laid-back yet stylish, practical, yet a feast for the eyes, tone on tone colouring with a subtle play on textures.”

The main brief? To design a large, bright area, centred on an open-plan  kitchen and living space that seamlessly flowed from indoors to outside. With one of the owners being a keen baker, it was integral that the kitchen be transformed from uninspired to a functional space that would meet all of her needs. The renovation also called for the addition of a TV room and an en-suite bathroom. The home’s original dark interiors were replaced with light-filled areas throughout, from the main bedroom to the spacious, open living area.

“Part of the brief was to add a pool in the backyard and to demolish the out building in the corner, but I managed to convince them to keep it and convert it into a pool pavilion,” says Hanno. The result is an entertainer’s dream, a space complete with a dining and kitchen area that seamlessly flows outdoors to the swimming pool and courtyard.

“It is so rewarding to know my clients are now loving their (almost) new house,” says Hanno, “and that good design can actually enhance lifestyles.”

“Our home is everything we envisioned,” says the couple, “a design that fits the way we live our lives and complements our style.”

Missed our previous post on Hanno’s revamp of a cottage in Milnerton? View it here.

The post Before and After: Rondebosch House appeared first on Visi.

This contemporary suburban home offers open-plan living at its unadorned best.

Rondebosch, a Cape Town suburb with a distinctly colonial air, is not the neighbourhood one would expect to find cutting-edge architectural design, so the first glimpse of this ultramodern structure comes as something of a surprise.

Designed for a young family, the house offers relaxed living and is ideally suited to the South African indoor-outdoor lifestyle. In a nod to decades-old construction elements used extensively in the area, the architects used standard precast concrete breeze blocks in the construction of a striking screen wall that acts as the “face” of the dwelling.

“It allows light to permeate while providing privacy and dappled light to the guest wing and terrace,” say the Three14 Architects design team of Kim Benatar, Sian Fisher and Miles Appelgryn. “The client’s brief called for a contemporary, open-plan home that offers a relaxed lifestyle and takes advantage of the site and the views.” The design ticks all those boxes and more.

The first floor consists of bedroom accommodation, taking the form of a minimal white box that hovers over the living spaces on the ground floor. Strategic openings in the box make the most of views of Devil’s Peak and the broader Table Mountain range, while maximising exposure to light.

At ground level, a central courtyard adjacent to the kitchen and dining room creates a focal point, complete with the dramatic screen wall, which creates an open-air terrace for the guest wing of the house, offering privacy from the street and allowing views and light to permeate.

The main gathering spaces in the home, both at ground level and upstairs, open onto the courtyard, which ties the spaces together vertically. The courtyard was built to accommodate a large focal tree, the canopy of which allows dappled light to filter into the living spaces without compromising on privacy. It is one of the design’s success stories.

Another success story is the wall that forms the back edge of the open-plan living space. Housing functional living necessities such as a fireplace and the kitchen cooking zone, the wall was conceived as a continuous element, stretching across the entire space and strengthening the open-plan arrangement.

The architects say the owners had two primary concerns: taking advantage of the orientation of the site and the mountain views, and open-plan living. “From an architectural point of view, the screen façade, street elevation, stairs and off-shutter walls received special attention due to their positioning and functionality.”

One of the joys of this project was the fact the client’s requirement – a bold and contemporary space with clean lines and a minimalist style – was completely in tune with the work favoured by Three14 Architects. “The accommodation requirements were stipulated, but we were unrestricted in the arrangement of space and the architectural expression developed from this. There was strong synchronicity between the client and the design team in terms of the overall aesthetic, selection of materials and finishes.”

The result is a marriage of true minds. Open-plan living areas devoid of decorative features and fiddly finishes rely on large expanses of glass to blur the boundaries between inside and outside spaces, making this home perfect for the South African climate and the young family that calls it home.

Looking for more architectural inspiration? Take a look this renovated Rondebosch home.

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