COMPILED BY Michaela Stehr PHOTOS Elsa Young/Frank Features; Micky Hoyle; Henrique Wilding; Jan Ras; Dear Heart Photography; Wil Punt; Grace Charlotte Photography; Greg Cox/Frank Features; Mathew Van Niekerk; Greg Cox/Bureaux

From big and bold to nautical chic, these beach homes are a welcome escape from the hustle and bustle of city living.

Kommetjie House

Nestled atop a dune in Kommetjie, the family home that architect and ceramicist Emma Day shares with her businessman husband, Chris, and their two teenage children is a triumph of intuitive design. It’s the realisation of a long-held dream for the couple, who had wanted to give their children the kind of coastal lifestyle they’d had growing up. “I grew up in Ramsgate on the south coast of KwaZulu-Natal, while Chris grew up in Kommetjie,” says Emma. “So it definitely felt like a homecoming for us when we found this plot in Klein Slangkop eco-estate.”

Read the full story on this Kommetjie house.

Onrus Beach Cottage

The little white cottage that Megan and Casper Geldenhuys built in Onrus 30 years ago speaks of precious times with family and friends, a life lived close to nature and a deep respect for the setting. The little white cottage is perched as though airlifted there on the shores of Onrus Lagoon. At first glance it is an unremarkable clapboard structure. Sitting off-kilter on a large stand, it is rectangular, made entirely of timber painted white from top to toe both outside and inside, and has big windows – not a burglar bar or ostentatious element in sight.

Read the full story on this Onrus beach cottage.

Modern Marine Home

A marine-meets-modern beach house on the west coast embraces open spaces and a peaceful palette for the ultimate low-key retreat. An intimate understanding of the small coastal town of Yzerfontein has made Evi Elsner something of an expert when it comes to creating beach homes in this idyllic enclave. Originally from Germany, Evi and her husband Jochem lived in Somerset West for 15 years before relocating to Yzerfontein, where they established themselves as sought-after dream-house developers. Combining architectural, interior design and building skills, the husband-and-wife team found a winning formula: Home Concept, their business, starts from the ground up, quite literally.

Read the full story on this modern beach house in Yzerfontein.

Yzerfontein Beach House

Built on what is probably the most perfect plot in Yzerfontein on the West Coast, this incredible beach house actually magnifies the effects of its beautiful surroundings. The house, named To the Moon and Back, is located at the very end of the southernmost beach road in Yzerfontein, bordering on Tygerfontein, a private nature reserve with pristine strandveld vegetation. The owners fell in love with “the best-kept secret of the West Coast” after attending an auction in town. As soon as this plot became available, they snapped it up.

Read the full story on this Yzerfontein beach house.

Bakoven Beach Escape

Struck by the magnificent mountain-and-ocean setting of this three-level Bakoven bungalow, interior designer Susanne Brodnik, founder of My Place in Cape Town, sought to create a unifying design language and a bright, light, open interior. The brief to Susanne from the property’s well-travelled international owners was for a home away from home. “As a parent myself, I immediately understood when the owners, who have a young son, said to me: ‘We want to arrive at this house and be at home.’ Everything is built around that sentence. I needed to create an easy living, open plan, holiday home; a second home for the owners to unwind and simply relax as soon as they arrive,” she says.

Read the full story on this Bakoven beach house.

Floating Dune House

Architect Johann Slee’s latest creation hovers over and among milkwood trees above the dunes in Sedgefield. The name ‘Floating Dune House’ comes from its minimal impact on the sensitive and unique dune vegetation. “The footprint of the house was kept as compact as possible,” explains Johann, “by introducing a cantilevered building edge that is raised above the vegetation, giving the illusion of floating on the dunes.” During the building process alien plants were removed, leaving gaps in the indigenous milkwood trees that created natural portals to the sea views. The brief was to embrace the milkwoods, and the result, in fact, was to be embraced by them.

Read the full story on this Sedgefield beach house.

The Boat House

Designer Rhett Williams-Jones and architect Lawden Holmes transformed an unused storage room in Yzerfontein into this tranquil West Coast hideaway, aptly named The Boat House. The renovation of the tiny space embodies a contemporary coastal charm, purposeful in its intention to connect to the exterior landscape.

The Boat House sits adjacent to a greenbelt in the ever-expanding West Coast town of Yzerfontein. Due to the increased development in the area and the threat it poses to the fynbos and ‘beach vegetation’ endemic to the coastal areas around Cape Town, Rhett wanted to enforce the space’s connection to the outdoors. “It was something we wanted to be clear from the moment you step through the front door – the connection to the fauna and flora,” says Rhett. “That flow between interior and exterior also makes the small space feel that much bigger”.

Read the full story on The Boat House.

Scarborough Home

The inspired architectural design of this contemporary weekender works as a series of controlled openings that respond to the area’s wild weather conditions while cleverly merging African and Mediterranean design principles with the owners’ distinctive sense of style.

What started as an occasional getaway to the coastal village of Scarborough grew into a full-blown love affair for the owners of this home – a creative director and a surgeon. “Just 45 minutes from Cape Town, Scarborough is the last village before Cape Point – a little piece of heaven within walking distance of the beach,” they say.

Read the full story on this Scarborough home.

Llandudno Beach House Renovation

For the renovation of this beach house, architectural designer Hanno de Swardt of Onnah Design made use of texture and colour to give this outdated Llandudno villa a new lease on life.

“My clients wanted to maximise the view from this plot so our design brief for this project was all about increasing the outdoor entertainment spaces and giving the interior of the house a much-needed update,” says architectural designer Hanno de Swardt.

While the main house remained intact, the outside needed some major structural interventions. Hanno raised the previous lawn level by almost 750mm through the use of terraced terraforce blocks. “This allowed the inside to flow easily to the outside, and kept the lawn and pool all on one level. By raising the lawn level we actually reduced the amount of excavation needed for the pool, which benefited the final budget,” he says.

Read the full story on this Llandudno beach house renovation.

Vermont House

Location, estate agents like to say, is everything. And this newly built home’s position in Vermont – a holiday hamlet on the pristine shores of Walker Bay – is exceptional. Tucked into the fynbos just steps from the ocean, the plot of land on which it stands has been in the family of one of the two homeowners, Alida Kannemeyer, for 60 years. Throughout her childhood, Alida spent her holidays in the house next door (the rest of her family still does so); in 2014, she was given this adjacent plot by her parents.

In 2017, Alida and Piers Buckle – her partner in both life and work (they run a graphic-design agency together) – decided to build their own holiday home on the property. At the time, the couple were living in Observatory, Cape Town, and the new build was envisioned as a weekend escape from the city at which they could also spend longer holidays. The initial plan, done with the help of an architect friend in Cape Town, was a simple single-storey cottage; it was later amended slightly by Onrus-based architecture firm Engelbrecht & Scorgie, who also assisted with the build.

Read the full story on this Vermont House.

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The post Dreamy Local Beach Houses appeared first on Visi.

With 2024 around the corner, we’ve decided to round up some of the most-read features on VISI this year. From luxe retreats to ultra modern beach houses, here’s a look at your top 15 favourite spaces of 2023 (and checkout our faves from 2022 and 2021, too).

Pringle Bay Home

As in most coastal locations, the ever-changing weather governs most activity here. When the VISI team visited to photograph this Pringle Bay house, our shoot began in peaceful sunshine at low tide, with the sea calm, and breathtakingly clear visibility right across False Bay. Then, as the tide came in and waves began crashing onto the rocks, a rainstorm crossed the bay, washing the crisp vista clean away and instead creating a dramatic, moody outlook.

Accordingly, this home is designed to suit all of these possibilities: it’s equipped with everything that might be required for indoor cocooning, as well as a glazed sea-facing facade that maximises the views no matter the weather conditions. The north-facing glass facade also opens up onto a generous deck, with a new all-natural swimming pool – built in a location-appropriate, raised “plaasdam” style – in the foreground.

Read the full story, here.

Yzerfontein Oceanfront Home

The barn was supposed to be a greenhouse. Located next to homeowners Jochem and Evi Elsner’s primary residence in Yzerfontein, the initial idea was to construct Evi’s dream of a next-door greenhouse, veggie garden and chicken coop alongside their home. “When the plot became available, we immediately thought, ‘Let’s buy it and build, before someone else does, and builds something ugly next door to us’,” says Evi.

Originally from Germany but having lived in South Africa for more than 20 years, Jochem and Evi’s prior address was in Somerset West. “We loved living there, but over the years it became too busy and built up,” Evi explains. “About seven years ago, we decided we wanted to move somewhere else, and Yzerfontein was the place to be. We had it on good authority from friends, and from the many photographers we know, that it was an idyllic location – beautiful and uncrowded. We visited the area and were sold immediately.”

Read the full story, here.

Scarborough Home

As the owners and founders of hope distillery, one of the first small-batch distillers of craft gin in South Africa, Leigh Lisk and Lucy Beard had grown tired of living on-site at their distillery in Cape Town, and wanted a bolthole to which they could escape every weekend. “Both Leigh and I are keen cyclists and runners who love the outdoors, and so the natural beauty of Scarborough and its proximity to the city made it an obvious choice for us,” says Lucy.

Initially, they had bought an old, abandoned tennis court in the coastal village with a view to building on that, but the prospect of a two-year brick-and-mortar build saw them buy an old one-bedroom, prefab home in the village as a stopgap. “We initially saw it as an interim house that would allow us to stay in Scarborough while overseeing the build – but we ended up loving the house so much that it has become our home.”

Read the full story, here.

Benoni House

Compact and low-maintenance were two keywords in the brief to architect Andrew Payne before design began on this project. The owners – a South African couple of Greek origin with two young children – were looking to downscale from the expansive home they’d been living in. “The owners were tired of being slaves to their home; it required a lot of upkeep, and they realised that they mostly only spent time in a third of it,” says Andrew, founder and managing director of Drew Architects. “They wanted something more suited to their needs as a family and, most importantly, a place they would not need to spend much time and money maintaining.”

Having found an acre of land in Greenfields, which they then sub-divided, the couple initially contacted Miguel Simoes of Vestim Construction, the contractor on their previous home, and asked him to be part of the project. Miguel’s only condition was that he got to handpick the architects, which is when he got in touch with Drew Architects.

Read the full story, here.

Sea Point Apartments

Situated in the middle of Fresnaye and the Sea Point Promenade, and wedged between a combination of dated flats, same- same modern apartment blocks and an excess of commercial entities, is The Flamingo. As with all structures designed by architects extraordinaire Robert Silke & Partners, nothing about this building is ordinary. Known for his love of Art Deco, Modernism and PoMo, Robert refers to The Flamingo’s aesthetic as “Bauhaus on heat”. Unlike the uninspired steel-and-glass high-rises infiltrating Cape Town’s Atlantic Seaboard and CBD, The Flamingo – similar to the architecture studio’s Tuynhuys apartments in the city centre and Anew Hotel in Green Point – is a breath of fresh air, with curved white walls, black accents and a spectacular glass-bricked eight-floor stairwell that makes you want to up your step count rather than take the soundless and speedy lift.

Commissioned by Signatura, with whom Robert has worked before, the brief was to create something compact and fun. “They came to us because they’re familiar with our work, and they knew we would give them something completely different from what is generally built in this area,” he says. “The development’s main goal was to be able to offer modern, exciting, fully self-catering micro-apartments, predominantly for holiday rentals and the Airbnb market.”

Read the full story, here.

Kenilworth House

You know, I counted every single brick in this house,” says architect Adèle Naudé Santos, smiling, as she stands looking around the main bedroom of the first house she ever designed – a solid Modernist four-bedroomer completed in 1967 and situated in a narrow, leafy avenue in Cape Town’s Kenilworth.

She may not actually be joking. Their modular layout, visible through the unplastered whitewashed walls, means you could conceivably measure the dimensions of the house brick by brick. US-based Adèle may now be a world-renowned architect, but back then she was just starting her career, and this was her first-ever build. And as if the stakes weren’t high enough, the client was her father, the late architect Hugo Naudé.

“My father didn’t want me to become an architect because he didn’t believe it was a woman’s profession,” says Adèle. “When I graduated top of my class in my third year at UCT, he told me it was time to move on – so I went to London to complete my degree at the Architectural Association.

Read the full story, here.

Scarborough House

“I thought I was a city girl – until I spent lockdown in Scarborough,” says South African film director Nicole Ackermann. That this small coastal village just outside Cape Point Nature Reserve in Cape Town is now her home was as much a surprise to her as it was to her family and friends. A place of wild winds and brutally cold water, its untamed beauty is not for everyone – yet it struck a chord with the globe-trotting Nicole the moment she arrived. “My time here changed my outlook and values significantly. Up until then, I was more outwardly seeking for inspiration; now I realise the value of looking inwards more.”

When the world returned to “normal”, Nicole found herself back in Los Angeles for work, but regularly trawling property websites in the hopes of finding a home in Scarborough. “It was quite a revelation that, although living here wasn’t necessarily what I had envisaged for myself, it was what I desperately craved.” So when this house came up for sale, her family were sent to check it out. “I remember my sister sending me a video that she took outside the back kitchen door,” says Nicole with a smile. “Hearing the cicadas and the sound of the ocean made me incredibly emotional; it was like a homecoming. Just like that, it was a done deal – I literally bought it unseen.”

Read the full story, here.

Fish Hoek House

As many couples did during the pandemic, Lauren Shantall and her husband Derek Eyden re-evaluated their lifestyle. To beat the claustrophobia of their new work-from-home regimen, Lauren, who runs her own PR company, and musician Derek would regularly pile into the car with their 13-year-old son Daniel, and make the trek from Rosebank in the heart of Cape Town’s suburbia to the Deep South – the colloquial name used for the slack-paced string of suburbs that hug the Cape Peninsula’s coastline. “We were waking up three, four times a week to go for sunrise swims,” says Lauren. “Covid meant that I suddenly lost 40% of my business – but it also meant that I could work from anywhere. We realised we could minimise our petrol bill and just move to live next to the ocean!”

The Mid-century Prairie-style house the couple ended up buying in Fish Hoek wasn’t exactly their architectural dream, but its lofty location against the mountain, with a view of both the Atlantic and Indian oceans, was. “It was one of those 1960s box houses, where you open the front door and walk into a rectangle,” says Lauren. “Derek and I knew roughly what we wanted to do. We measured the space, made little scale drawings and cut out pieces of furniture that we’d move around, trying endless configurations.”

Read the full story, here.

Forest Town House

The Colemans are not your average suburbanites – although chatting to the humble Audrey Coleman, now 90, you wouldn’t guess it. She and her late husband, Max, were active human-rights advocates during the apartheid years, both working for the Detainees’ Parents Support Committee, with Audrey also a long-standing and celebrated member of the legendary human- rights organisation, Black Sash.

House Coleman has major cred too. Built in the early 1980s, it’s a masterpiece of clean lines and geometric shapes and, though tailor-made to be its owners’ retirement home, it’s also a piece of South African design history. “Our son Colin was a student at Wits University and insisted that Pancho Guedes was the only person for the job,” says Audrey of their choice of architect.

Amâncio d’Alpoim Miranda “Pancho” Guedes was a famed architect, artist and educator, and head of the school of architecture at Wits. Born in Portugal, he spent most of his life in Mozambique. It’s difficult to sum up such an important figure in African Modernist architecture, but there is no doubt he pushed boundaries. Known for his sculptural and well-thought-out buildings, Guedes was inspired by surrealism, African art and Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí, whose work motivated him to experiment, as well as by pioneers of Modernism in Brazil, like Affonso Reidy and Oscar Niemeyer.

Read the full story, here.

Paarl House

You’d be forgiven for inferring that the domed column that punctuates Pine Concrete House pays poetic tribute to Paarl Rock, the gigantic granite outcrop looming in its background. “You’ll have to talk to my dad about the metaphors of this house,” says a smiling Johannes Berry, who co-founded Brussels-based architectural firm Sugiberry with his wife Mayu Takasugi in 2016.

Fortuitous as the architectural echo is, the concrete-and-wood residence’s design was informed by a set of logical principles that Johannes and Mayu work according to,rather than any visual reference.“We like to consider the potential in what already exists,” he explains. In the case of Pine Concrete House, what existed was the double-storey home of Johannes’s parents, Roland and Elmine. “The initial brief from them was to build a double garage – but like most projects, it grew,” says Johannes. “They’re getting older, and because of the size of their house, we proposed renovating it so it could ultimately be split into three self-contained parts – a top half, a bottom half and an extension – so they’d still be able to live there, but rent out the two other spaces.”

Read the full story, here.

Monaghan Farm House

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.

Read the full story, here.

Parkview House

I think the sunset sold it,” says architect Vedhant Maharaj. The outlook from this house on the crest of the Parkview ridge stretches across 270 degrees of the city’s urban forest – and the sunsets are spectacular. The character of this unexpected Modernist gem was buried beneath various additions and alterations, not least a steel mono-pitched roof that had been plonked on top. “But it had good bones. You could see that,” says Vedhant, who founded Rebel Base Collective, the multidisciplinary architecture and design studio, in 2017. A little investigation revealed the home had been designed in 1935 by a firm called Small and Schaerer, who created several well-known Joburg buildings, including Central Fire Station. By the 1930s, they were known for “an eclectic Modernistic style, with balconies jutting out at irregular spacings” as one account on architectural heritage database Artefacts describes it. It also mentions that their designs “tend towards the picturesque” – an approach that emphasises not just formal beauty but also a sense of the sublime.

Read the full story, here.

Modernist Durban Home

On first encounter, House Shaw is brutally simple: a series of three-dimensional boxes, positioned beside and on top of one another on a long, triangular site cut into one of the steep slopes that characterise Durban’s forested university suburb. It is made of face brick, concrete, louvre windows, shutters and a bit of aluminium; no need for paint, wallpaper, air conditioning – not even curtains.

The house belongs to Colleen Wygers, who lived here with her late husband, fellow architect Paul Wygers. Sadly, Paul passed away shortly after we photographed the house; with Colleen’s permission, we’ve included his observations from that interview.

Paul liked to describe the home as Modernism morphing the heritage Durban veranda home – and, when it went onto the market in 2013, the couple bought it within hours of their first viewing. Designed by Hallen and Dibb Architects in the 1960s, it had been commissioned by legal luminary Douglas Shaw. “Douglas Shaw was sitting in an Eames chair in the lounge,” recalled Paul. “We chatted briefly about art and architecture. I don’t think he wanted to leave.”

Read the full story, here.

Bo-Kaap House

If ever you’re asked to illustrate the Chinese concept of balanced dualism, you could do worse than to drop them a pin at 250 Buitengracht in Cape Town. Approach it from the front, and you’re met with a textbook Victorian cottage facade, replete with wraparound veranda shaded by a sweeping corrugated-iron roof – but walk around the corner and up towards Signal Hill, and the house spills over into a set of contemporary sheds. To the left, it’s flanked by the moneyed suburb of Tamboerskloof, with the historically Cape Malay area of the Bo-Kaap to the right. Inside, the house is split neatly down the middle into two almost identical, self-contained double-storey residences – one with a view of Table Mountain, which can be seen through a bespoke conservatory; the other looking out onto Carisbrook Street, and the Bo-Kaap and CBD beyond it.

“Our clients, Fred Durow and Ben Schoeman, are city planners, and bought the property with the idea of creating a double dwelling and work-from-home opportunity, as well as the option to generate rental income,” says Antony Abate, director at Team Architects. “We wanted to maximise the site’s potential, while being true to our ethics and beliefs in terms of urban design, contextual fit, scale and interaction with the streets,” adds Fred.

Read the full story, here.

Tulbagh House

It was six years ago, while exploring a “potential art project” in the small Western Cape town of Tulbagh, that Abigail Rands stumbled on this remarkable building. Her family owns a wine farm nearby, so she feels a strong connection to the area; and besides, she says, “I like beautiful architecture, raw materials and good art.” And this house had all three in bucketloads.

It is one of the oldest buildings in the town – the first monastery and mission school established in 1797 – and its distinctive gables, thick whitewashed walls, wooden rafters and thatched roof were the very embodiment of traditional Cape Winelands architecture. More recently, however, the artist Christo Coetzee lived there from the 1970s until his death at the turn of the century. For a time afterwards, the house was a museum dedicated to his life and work.

“A friend of Christo’s took us around and told us stories about each artwork. Everything I took in that day stayed with me,” says Abigail – and it wasn’t long before she came back. This time, she’d had an idea: she wanted to turn the house into a retreat of sorts; a place where, as she puts it, “you can let go and connect with how you really feel”. Later, her vision came to include a yoga studio in the old monastery building (which had once served as Coetzee’s studio).

Red the full story, here.

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The post VISI’s Top Architectural Features of 2023 appeared first on Visi.

After buying it sight unseen in the Western Cape coastal village of Scarborough, this home’s owner not only effected an extensive refurbishment, but also found herself personally transformed by living here.

“I thought I was a city girl – until I spent lockdown in Scarborough,” says South African film director Nicole Ackermann. That this small coastal village just outside Cape Point Nature Reserve in Cape Town is now her home was as much a surprise to her as it was to her family and friends. A place of wild winds and brutally cold water, its untamed beauty is not for everyone – yet it struck a chord with the globe-trotting Nicole the moment she arrived. “My time here changed my outlook and values significantly. Up until then, I was more outwardly seeking for inspiration; now I realise the value of looking inwards more.”

When the world returned to “normal”, Nicole found herself back in Los Angeles for work, but regularly trawling property websites in the hopes of finding a home in Scarborough. “It was quite a revelation that, although living here wasn’t necessarily what I had envisaged for myself, it was what I desperately craved.” So when this house came up for sale, her family were sent to check it out. “I remember my sister sending me a video that she took outside the back kitchen door,” says Nicole with a smile. “Hearing the cicadas and the sound of the ocean made me incredibly emotional; it was like a homecoming. Just like that, it was a done deal – I literally bought it unseen.”

When she was finally able to see the house in person, she had no regrets. “The high-volume arched windows were what initially caught my attention, and they were even better in reality, as the house had been so beautifully designed around them,” she says. As a whole, the home has four bedrooms, but it can be split into three separate units. The main house has its own entrance and two en suite bedrooms, as well as a living, dining and kitchen area; while the cottage that leads off the back courtyard is a single dwelling with its own kitchen, en suite bathroom and entrance. The basement of the house is where you’ll find the laundry, a studio, and another guest bedroom with its own entrance. “There are also two container rooms that I currently use as storage space but that are earmarked for a cinema,” says Nicole.

Although Nicole’s plans were initially for a fairly superficial refurbishment, once she started, she realised broad strokes were required. Structurally, the biggest change was the relocation of the original kitchen to the other side of the living area. “I’m not a cook but I love entertaining, and so I wanted an area where you could read and lounge and take in the incredible views.” Today, an L-shaped built-in banquette deep enough to sleep on wraps around the dining table, while the kitchen has direct access to the back dining area and another terrace.

All the bathrooms were replaced and the floors sanded and repainted, while outdoors, a pool, a Jacuzzi and a deck were installed, along with an entirely new cactus and succulent garden. “I’ve worked a lot in Mexico and found Frida Kahlo’s house hugely inspirational, hence the cactus garden – and my love of skulls and crystals too!” The original house was white, but Nicole’s desire for it to complement the environment called for something drastic – all black. “I find black very soothing, and I love how the house now reads against the mountain. It’s unobtrusive, and any greenery you put against it just pops.’

Nicole started off with an interior designer but ended up completing the project on her own. “I wanted to create a series of neutral, luxe spaces that felt good to be in, but also comfortable and connected to the outdoors.” A calm yet sophisticated palette of stone, linen, leather and wood is the perfect canvas for a life punctuated by music evenings, film club, family gatherings and days at the pool. With views from every room, and mountain walks in Baskloof Private Fynbos Nature Reserve just two minutes from her back door, it’s a dream lifestyle. “Scarborough has a legacy of wild expression and cultural rebellion that I felt drawn to, and a creative community that has become my tribe.”

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The post Scarborough House appeared first on Visi.

This modular home in a Cape coastal village has been created to host the friends and family of an outdoor-loving couple.

As the owners and founders of hope distillery, one of the first small-batch distillers of craft gin in South Africa, Leigh Lisk and Lucy Beard had grown tired of living on-site at their distillery in Cape Town, and wanted a bolthole to which they could escape every weekend. “Both Leigh and I are keen cyclists and runners who love the outdoors, and so the natural beauty of Scarborough and its proximity to the city made it an obvious choice for us,” says Lucy.

Initially, they had bought an old, abandoned tennis court in the coastal village with a view to building on that, but the prospect of a two-year brick-and-mortar build saw them buy an old one-bedroom, prefab home in the village as a stopgap. “We initially saw it as an interim house that would allow us to stay in Scarborough while overseeing the build – but we ended up loving the house so much that it has become our home.”

READ MORE: Dreamy Local beach Houses

Having long admired the German Huf Haus (a prefab-style home) as well as the tiny house movement (an architectural and social philosophy that advocates the simplification of living spaces), the idea for something small and sustainable quickly took hold. “We liked the idea of building a modular structure that would blend into the environment with minimal impact, and a container home made sense as it’s less expensive than building from scratch,” says Lucy.

The couple worked with Dean Westmore of Podula to custom-design and make a lightweight steel structure to suit their needs. “Our own home is too small to host guests, so the idea was to create a hospitable place where friends and family could stay when they come to visit, and somewhere that we could entertain en masse,” says Lucy.

Today, Twin Peaks, as the couple call it, sets a svelte stance with its black exterior, clean lines and a pair of barn-like pitched roof structures. Laid out on one level, the 110m2 home is a minimal, utilitarian retreat comprising two en suite bedrooms that flank a generous open-plan kitchen, dining and living area, which leads out onto an entertainment deck. The second bedroom functions as a separate, independent space. “It was part of the design brief,” says Lucy. “Our thinking was that those friends with families and teenage kids could have their own access to the beach and outside entertainment areas, without the need to disturb the main house.”

READ MORE: Olive View Luxury Eco-pods by untether

Leigh and Lucy kept to a simple palette of black exterior and white interior walls, allowing their furnishings, art and trappings of daily life to animate the space. “The great thing about a pod-style home is that it comes with all the finishes, so we had none of that admin to deal with.” They did have their hands full, however, with trying to make the house off-grid in terms of electricity. “We initially put in one battery and 14 solar panels, but soon realised that to run the house overnight required the entire battery,” says Lucy. A second solar battery got them comfortably through the summer months; winter was another story. “That’s when we knew we had to connect to the grid to ensure continuity of power, come rain or shine,” she adds. Still, to date, they’ve used Eskom to supply just 10% of their total energy requirements. “Given the unique circumstances in South Africa, it’s a good result,” says Leigh.

Leigh and Lucy’s commitment to achieving the best outcome, their interest in getting things right and their enjoyment of the overall process are evident in the finished result.“We’ve learnt so much,” says Lucy, “and we feel privileged to have been able to create a space suited to our lifestyle that is also sustainable and imbued with the simplicity we prefer.”

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The post Scarborough Home appeared first on Visi.

With 2023 around the corner, we’ve decided to round up some of the most-read features on VISI this year. From secluded mountain retreats to ultra modern beach houses, here’s a look at your top 15 favourite spaces in 2022 (and checkout our faves from 2024, 2023, and 2021, too).

The Boat House

When we initially bought this property we didn’t give the old unused boat shed attached to it much thought until one afternoon when we were having beers outside and decided to go see what was actually in this storage space. Whilst we were scratching through all the contents in the shed (a few amazing mid-century pieces were hiding in there!), my friend said we should convert it into an Airbnb. And as they say, the rest was history,” explains designer Rhett Williams-Jones.

The Boat House sits adjacent to a greenbelt in the ever-expanding West Coast town of Yzerfontein. Due to the increased development in the area and the threat it poses to the fynbos and ‘beach vegetation’ endemic to the coastal areas around Cape Town, Rhett wanted to enforce the space’s connection to the outdoors.

Read the full story on the Boat House.

Paarl Mountain Home

Standing in the courtyard, looking straight through the wide doors and over the rim-flow pool, you get a magnificent view of the Drakenstein Mountains at the other side of the valley,” says architect Erik Grobler. It’s this breathtaking view, the plot’s proximity to nature and the client’s love of natural materials which ultimately set the scene for Erik’s minimalistic design.

Read the full story on this Paarl Mountain home.

Pinelands Home

here’s a certain witchiness to Robert Silke‘s new family home in the Cape Town suburb of Pinelands. A darkly dramatic front gate framed by a brick archway reading Caverswall opens onto a narrow garden path, which leads you to a house that’s equal parts imposing and intriguing, with a steeply pitched, clay-tiled roof, spiral chimneys and brickwork finish – all in the same burnt-honey shade. “It’s basically a gingerbread house, right?” says Robert, taking in the facade of the 1938 Arts and Crafts Revival structure he shares with partner Gideon and their one-year-old daughter Lilith.

Read the full story on this Pinelands home.

Birdhaven Home

Creating a sense of awe and occasion in a family home is no easy feat.

For David Hollis, founder of Arch3D Architects, the approach to this brief was all about the juxtaposition of materials and designing a visual feast for the senses. After visiting the owners’ previous home, he noticed the lack of volume and layering. “Each space merged into another, with no identity,’’ David says. “I wanted to play with volume here, and bring the excitement of creating a unique feeling of space within each function of the home, but still maintain that easy, flowing openness.” An amalgamation of these concepts has resulted in a space that allows for both family interaction and for refuge, based around a central statement hub.

Read the full story on this Birdhaven home.

Modern Concrete Home in Plett

You know, I’ve been practising Tai Chi for 30 years, and in it, we say, ‘Stand like a mountain, flow like a river,’” says architect Paul Oosthuizen. Yes, he’s passionate about the Chinese martial art, but in this particular instance, he’s using the Tai Chi principle to illustrate his motivation behind the design of a very special beachfront property.

Receding into a thicket of milkwood trees on a rocky outcrop that runs down into the Keurbooms estuary in Plettenberg Bay, the house in question is undeniably sculptural, with an interplay of curved and angular lines, and the raw materiality of a concrete finish.

Read the full story on this modern home in Plett.

Graaff-Reinet Pods

Iain Buchanan, conservationist and founder of Mount Camdeboo Private Game Reserve near Graaff-Reinet in the Eastern Cape, took his family for an extended stay at the reserve during the pandemic. They did quite a lot of camping out in the veld, he says, seeking out some of the more remote (but spectacularly beautiful) spots to pitch their tent.

While the reserve has a lodge and other accommodation, the experience left him wondering how he could offer guests the immediacy of the camping experience – the sense of awe you feel being alone in the vast wide-open – but with a dimension of luxury and comfort. The idea posed several challenges. The Karoo is known for its temperature extremes, so “the traditional old Livingston-type canvas tent just wouldn’t cut it,” says Iain. But conventional building in the “middle of nowhere” is difficult and messy, and scars the landscape. A pod or tiny house, however, might work: a little Scandi-inspired hut, designed just right.

Read the full story on these Graaff-Reinet pods.

Johannesburg Home

In Johannesburg, there’s no mountain and there’s no sea,” says architect Anthony Orelowitz, referring to homes in Cape Town that tend to look outwards, seeking to catch a glimpse of the ocean or frame a view of Table Mountain. “Here, you have to create your own habitat.” And that, at heart, was the basis of his response to Johannesburg’s urban character when he designed his own home in the city’s forested suburbs. Anthony’s firm, Paragon, is responsible for some of the city’s most significant commercial architectural landmarks – but, he says, “I hadn’t done a house in nearly 15 years.” Nevertheless, working closely with architect Elliot Marsden and interior designer Julia Day, he conjured a vision of what it means to make a home in Joburg, at once perfectly suited to the city and utterly unlike its neighbours.

Read the full story on this Johannesburg home.

Nieu-Bethesda Home

Most famous for its legendary, reclusive, eccentric resident, artist Helen Martins, and her home, the Owl House, the town of Nieu-Bethesda is as far as you can get from South Africa’s big metropoles. From Joburg, it’ll take you just under nine hours to get to this remote dot nestled among the koppies of the semi-arid Great Karoo; it might be 15 minutes less from Cape Town. And that’s just one reason that made Joburg couple Marc Watson and James Moffatt’s decision to buy a house here a brave one. The other was that they bought it without seeing the interior.

Visiting here as tourists in 2018, they bought the cottage based purely on its charming iron friezes and traditional wooden shutters, only guessing at what was hidden behind the heritage façade. “But we had a good sense of what such a traditional home would hold,” says Marc.

Read the full story on this Nieu-Bethesda home.

Signal Hill Home

It’s already become a cliché to say that the Covid-19 pandemic – and in particular, its lockdowns, which confined us to our homes for months on end in 2020 – changed the way we think about domestic space. These days, walk through a prospective new home, and one of the first questions that comes to mind is how you’d feel about being confined to that house for two months. And in the case of this cleverly remodelled abode in Cape Town, the answer is, “Bring it on immediately!”

Located in the upper regions of Green Point, the house is perched on the edge of Signal Hill, and unfolds over multiple levels to accommodate the steepness of the sloped plot. Past the street entrance and parking garage at the top of the house, a short, covered walkway – encased on one side by metal palisade-style balustrades, coated in an eye-catching trio of brass, copper and bronze – leads to the main door. Inside, one is quickly drawn into an expansive, open-plan lounge, dining and kitchen area, which works seamlessly as the main living space.

Read the full story on this Signal Hill home.

Keurboomstrand Home

There was a non-negotiable in the client brief: respect the land. It’s not difficult to see why – the parcel of earth the residence was built on is pristinely beautiful. “The farm is situated near Plettenberg Bay, on a large portion of land filled with indigenous forest, with rivers running through it and a view of the Tsitsikamma Mountains,” says architect Paul Oosthuizen, giving context to his client’s instructions. “There was one patch of invasive wattle on the land, which was cleared – this became the area we developed.”

To find the perfect spot on which to build, Paul surveyed the sloped piece of land by climbing some of the tall trees on its periphery, then decided on the bottom of the hill, so the house could be nestled into the forest and give his client a view of the riverbed. Next up, Simon Hart and his team at No Fuss Construction brought Paul’s vision to life. The result is a home that feels intimately connected to its woodsy surroundings, and secluded from the world beyond. In fact, reaching it is a pursuit that requires visitors to make the last 60-metre journey on foot.

Read the full story on this Keurboomstrand home.

Greenside home

It takes a good eye to spot potential in a fixer-upper, particularly in a city like Johannesburg. There are some real gems – almost always undervalued – but their qualities are often lost beneath the add-ons that barnacle their way onto houses over time. Christo Vermeulen and Nico Venter are serial renovators. Inevitably, after a few years of living in a house, they find their eyes wandering.

They most certainly do have a knack for recognising the signs that something special might be lurking beneath the surface a nondescript exterior. Christo is a former textile designer turned builder/renovator – with a sideline in manufacturing bespoke features, especially metalwork and ironmongery – and Nico is an urban designer with an interest in the city’s architectural history. Together, they make a formidable team: insightful and capable, with the perfect combination of vision and respect for the innate qualities of a good find.

Read the full story on this Greenside home.

Kalahari Lodge

Remote, exclusive and eco-conscious – and complete with tawny desert sunsets – Tswalu Kalahari embodies all the elements of a memorable safari experience. The Oppenheimer family, committed conservationists and custodians of this tract of stark beauty for more than two decades, are driven by their intent “to leave our world better than we found it”. And they are succeeding.

Two camps – Motse and the private villa Tarkuni – shimmer graciously in the sun. We featured Motse in VISI #106; now we focus on Tarkuni, and the camps’ acclaimed Klein JAN restaurant. As with Motse, an artful revamp by multidisciplinary design practice Savile Row has given the spaces a fresh, contemporary feel that doesn’t compete with the dramatic landscape that unfurls around them.

Read the full story on this Kalahari lodge.

Scarborough Beach Home

What started as an occasional getaway to the coastal village of Scarborough grew into a full-blown love affair for the owners of this home – a creative director and a surgeon. “Just 45 minutes from Cape Town, Scarborough is the last village before Cape Point – a little piece of heaven within walking distance of the beach,” they say.

The couple were so enamoured with the village, they had no desire to tell anyone about it – not even their three grown children. “It was a year before we took any of them with us,” they say with a laugh. “Predictably, they immediately fell in love with it too, and suggested we start looking for a place where we could all go to as a family.”

Read the full story on this Scarborough beach home.

Malmesbury Home

There was a wonderful feeling of glamorous decay to her,” says interior designer Etienne Hanekom of the grand old Victorian home he is lovingly restoring in Malmesbury. Languishing elegantly on a ridge overlooking the historic farming town an hour west of Cape Town, the generously proportioned four-bedroom house was built in 1850, when Malmesbury was still a popular destination for its revered hot springs.

Recent history, however, has not been kind. Rapid industrialisation of the town, as well as the ignominious positioning of a busy arterial road right in front of the house, threatened a fate of idle deterioration. Until Etienne stepped in. “I’d been keeping an eye on her, as I frequently used to drive past on my way to visit my parents,” he says. On an impulse, he decided to stop for a closer look, and discovered that the rambling 2 500m2 property took up an entire residential block, and had several unused outbuildings. The main house still retained original, metal- pressed ceiling tiles, timber floorboards and shutters, cast-iron fireplaces, and a deep front stoep so particular to its era.

Read the full story on this Malmesbury home.

Constantia Home

“We got some very funny reactions because it really wasn’t pretty,” says architect Sean Mahoney, recalling friends and colleagues visiting his newly completed house in the Cape Town suburb of Constantia for the first time. “The exterior was raw brick, and the garden had rubble lying everywhere. My architect friends, in particular, were just… quiet.”

The house, where he lives with his wife, artist and sculptor Justine Mahoney, and their daughters Ella and Biba, is an extreme example of one of his architectural mantras – as a partner in the firm StudioMAS, he believes the buildings he designs should look their worst on the day he hands over the keys. Or, in more marketable terms, they should look better with time. “Good architecture needs history,” he says.

Read the full story on this Constantia home.

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WORDS Celeste Jacobs PHOTOS DOOK, Greg Cox, Micky Hoyle, Jac de Villiers, Paris Brummer and Henrique Wilding

At Fifty Seven Waterberg (pictured above), the black concrete and steel define this striking vanity unit by Lumar Fourie of The Concrete Corporation, while linear ceiling panelling accentuates the elongated dimensions of the space.

The muted greys in the open-plan bathroom of this contemporary Cape Town home allow the astounding onyx shower wall to shine.

A timeless Philippe Starck bath, monocoated Joe van Rooyen vanity and minimalist mirrors result in a pleasing balance in this Hyde Park home.

Together with blonde timber and black metallic elements, the play on levels – between the exposed beams and the low vanity – creates contrast, while hidden lighting adds warmth. This Modern Irene home‘s en-suite bathroom’s black stonework and custom-made reflective shower glass by Elite Showers play with the abundant natural light.

A calming, natural colour palette in this Fresnaye apartment is enhanced by soft lighting – and the bath is elevated for a sense of ceremony.

In a family home in Midrand, industrial textures and materials are softened by crisp white fittings and warm lighting, creating a space that’s both welcoming and fresh.

Minimal meets organic in a bathroom that combines irregular shapes with clean lines, and textured stone with matte finishes.

A simple artwork and wooden accents sourced from Japan and India create a soothing, serene atmosphere in Scarborough retreat.

A masterful interplay of textures and contemporary and traditional elements in this bathroom at Kubili House in Thornybush is crowned by a calming view of the bushveld.

Full picture windows in this striking minimal bathroom at Cheetah Plains allows the outdoors right into the space – and make the bath an ideal vantage point for bird-watching and game viewing.

Industrial is taken to the next level in this pared-back West Coast cottage bathroom that features a vintage bath and exposed pipes. The window frames the fields outside during the day and offers a stargazing spectacle by night.

This Muldersdrift farmhouse‘s bathroom combines black metalwork and fittings with timber and concrete finishes for an unexpectedly warm and informal result – an effect that’s enhanced by freestanding ladder shelving and a mirror propped against the wall.

Smart, graphic partitioning makes a feature of the open-plan layout in this slick Higgovale home owned by chef Liam Tomlin.

Traditional and rustic styles and rough and smooth textures work in perfect harmony at Arijiju in the Kenyan highlands.

This contemporary Johannesburg home‘s geometric dreams are brought to life in a largely monochromatic interior accented by a rich jade-green statement wall and basin.

Designed to capture the essence and energy of Johannesburg, this dramatically lit emerald-green bathroom is a jewel-toned statement.

Combining curated art and artefacts – including an off-centre chandelier, sculptures and a Persian rug – this Cape Town City Bowl loft is a haven to relax in, complete with a ledge on which to rest a cup of tea.

Contrasting wall treatments – tiles and wallpaper – and unusual accessories come together to create a striking and eclectic bathroom in this Tamboerskloof home.

Bespoke Katie Lund wallpaper adorns a feature wall in this Bainskloof home, drawing attention to the beamed ceiling.

Linear in the extreme, this stark-white, black-trimmed bathroom is an ode to simplicity.

Rounded shapes and organic textures form a pleasing sense of cohesion and repetition in this minimal Yzerfontein home.

A slipper bath, lit from above by a pendant light and accented by art, adds elegance to an understated space.

With all the hallmarks of a traditional bathroom – arched, shuttered windows; a freestanding tub; classic tapware – plus an unexpected pop of rustic texture in the timber side table, this space is timeless.

A Nguni rug and colourful artwork add personality to a simple scheme.

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Comfort and the community of family were central to the renovation of celebrated design duo Geordi de Sousa Costa and Boyd Ferguson’s multi-generational weekend home.

My vision was to create a place of happiness, love and wellbeing for our extended family,” says co-owner Boyd Ferguson, founder of Cécile & Boyd, the design studio that single-handedly revolutionised the safari-lodge aesthetic 25 years ago.

Located in Scarborough, a seaside hamlet near Cape Point, his creation is a multi-generational retreat for himself, his sister Geordi De Sousa Costa, and their families. Named Abraça – the Portuguese word for an embrace or hug – it’s a weekend home where equal consideration has been given to everyone, from tweens, teens and singletons to family groups and oldies.

The family bought the property in 2018 for its generous double plot and inherent potential. Despite its awkward flow, an inelegant subterranean lower level with little light, and an enormous main en-suite – the only room with sweeping views of the wetlands, reserve and beach – Boyd saw enormous potential.

His major consideration in reconfiguring the spaces was to open the house to the garden while accommodating the family’s three generations and catering for the various activities they prefer. This called for plenty of reading and fireside spaces, work desks, and garden and outdoor spaces for relaxation and entertaining. With this in mind, Boyd set out to create two distinct areas in the home. Laid out over three floors that stagger over one another, the house has been split up into three private zones: the bottom level for Geordi, her husband Anton and their three children; Boyd’s wing on the upper loft level with the living area providing a buffer of privacy between them; and their parents’ wing, which runs parallel to the downstairs kitchen and entertaining areas.

Making sure that every room had access to the outdoors was a critical factor in this plan. To this end, Boyd made sure that all the back bedrooms had decks leading off them, in addition to three generous covered verandas (which are all fully furnished, as though they were interiors) that he created off the upstairs living area, the lower-level bedrooms and the kitchen. “It was important to create spaces that offered further privacy for those in search of a retreat and quiet time,” he says.

Boyd’s brother-in-law Anton, who is a stonemasonry specialist, project-managed the building work. Anton’s innate sense of style, combined with his technical and practical knowledge, would prove a critical asset as the family strived to respect and reuse what was there rather than replace the old with the new.

For the interiors, Boyd sought inspiration from the surrounding landscape as well as the home’s existing farmhouse-meets-beach cottage architectural style. He also ensured that each and every family member – ranging in age from 8 to 80 – was considered in the interior vision. “I added pigmented colour and contemporary art for the young ones, edgy cane furniture and lighting for Geordi (who wanted modernity), and soulful Indian country antiques for Mom and Dad,” he says. “My aesthetic came in the form of the stripped, pared-down colour palette with monastic stone floors, whitewashed walls and exposed beams.”

Boyd’s partner Athol McLaggan, a landscaper and head gardener at Stellenberg Gardens in Kenilworth, was responsible for a garden that thoroughly connects to the living spaces, mirroring the L-shaped home in a series of outdoor rooms. Unlike most properties in Scarborough, the garden is completely walled, so Athol’s inclination towards an inward-looking space that allowed for a green sanctuary was inspired.

“For me, one of the most beautiful views of the house is from the pedestrian gate, looking across the garden towards the courtyard,” says Athol. “From this angle, the two wings of the house are seen on the diagonal, and look like two outstretched arms ready to embrace you.”

Abraça is available for rental through Perfect Hideaways.

Looking for more architectural inspiration or local escapes? Check out this gorgeous  Klein Karoo farmhouse or these off-grid retreats.

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Exclusive Tree House Hideaway

Location: Scarborough

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 2

Host Description: Reminiscent of a Robinson Crusoe island hideaway, this private haven with endless ocean views is magically situated amongst gnarled trees and rocks in the tranquil coastal village of Scarborough. A luxurious sanctuary of impeccable taste and design.

Rate: R8 512 per night

Woodbine Contemporary Kalk Bay Home

Location: Kalk Bay

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 2

Host Description: Live in the heart of the Kalk Bay Village, yet enjoy the privacy of open-plan living in a botanically-inspired indigenous garden, with views all around of Kalk Bay Harbour, the ocean waters of False Bay and the local Kalk Bay Mountains.

Rate: R2 503 per night

The Perfect Beach Bungalow

Location: Misty Cliffs

Bedrooms: 3 / Bathrooms: 3

Host Description: Reminiscent of Malibu in the 1950s, extraordinary fully renovated bungalow featured as the cover of Architectural Digest Spain July 2015 issue. One of only 8 houses on the Misty Cliffs beach, a small and exclusive beach village 45 minutes from Cape Town, best known for its tranquility and beauty.

Rate: R6 711 per night

Experience The Heart Of Kalk Bay

Location: Kalk Bay

Bedrooms: 1 / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: Modern room with its own bathroom and private entrance in the heart of Kalk Bay. The room offers a quiet respite from the hustle and bustle with a view on to a beautiful garden. Tastefully decorated, small and compact with attention to detail.

Rate: R481 per night

Ziwayu Beach House

Location: Misty Cliffs

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 1.5

Host Description: A beautifully designed, newly-built family home carved into a mountain slope less than a hundred metres from the roaring Atlantic Ocean. Ziwayu house is situated in the small village of Misty Cliffs, 50 minutes from the centre of Cape Town.

Rate: R3 300 per night

St James Sea & Whaleview

Location: St James

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: Romantic, private and secure apartment with views of False Bay, nestled between Kalk Bay and Muizenberg. Ideal for an escape, whale watching (Sept – Nov), surfing and mountain walks. Quiet area, yet close enough to walk to beaches and restaurants.

Rate: R1 513 per night

Haven Bay Apartment

Location: Kalk Bay

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 2

Host Description: Stunning apartment with uninterrupted views over Kalk Bay harbour and False Bay. Situated in a charming village close to a great selection of restaurants and coffee shops. We also boast some of the world’s best beaches, a number of child-friendly tidal pools and numerous hiking trails – all within walking distance. The spacious and elegant rooms will enchant. Situated in a secure complex with 24-hour security.

Rate: R1 045 per night

Thunderclap Cottage

Location: Simon’s Town

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 2

Host Description: Beautiful, airy Victorian semi detached cottage with sea view and walking distance to the beach. Great for entertaining family and friends or a quiet, romantic getaway.

Rate: R1 251 per night

Belmont Cottage

Location: Kalk Bay

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 2

Host Description: A beautifully renovated cottage tucked away in the heart of Kalk Bay village. Open plan kitchen/sitting room. Main bedroom with en-suite. Loft room with four beds plus a bathroom. Five minutes from perfect swimming beach, restaurants and shops.

Rate: R1 430 per night

Fisherman’s Cottage

Location: Scarborough

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: This cosy cottage nestled in a village, has one bedroom, a loft and an open plan kitchen and living space with a wood burning fireplace. It has a large verandah looking on to a wild garden filled with birdlife from where you get a glimpse of the sea.

Rate: R1 196 per night

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Petite Designer Apartment

Location: Sea Point

Bedrooms: 1 / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: This petite top floor apartment has everything you need during a sea side holiday in Cape Town. All the finishes are of high quality. The aesthetic is clean, simple and elegant.

Rate: R1 002 per night

The Chapel at the House of Grace

Location: Simon’s Town

Bedrooms: 0 (Beds 1) / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: The Chapel forms part of the property at the House of Grace. Built in 1880, we envision many a holy ritual taking place in it. The energy is light and beautiful. We have recently played with the deco and made it look like an ancient treasure for you.

Rate: R579 per night

BETHSAIDA and Cabin

Location: Glencairn

Bedrooms: 1 / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: Between mountain and sea. Beautiful views. Comfy.

Rate: R798 per night

Spacious Designer 2BD In The City

Location: Cape Town CBD

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 2

Host Description: This spacious designer 2BD apartment is situated in the historic Wellington Fruit Growers building in the heart of the city. This generously proportioned 220sqm apartment is perfect for visitors to Cape Town seeking a luxurious inner city retreat.

Rate: R3 130 per night

Hilltop Garden Cottage

Location: Newlands

Bedrooms: 1 / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: Hilltop Garden Cottage is a modern self-catering unit situated at the end of a secure, quiet cul-de-sac in the beautiful suburb of Newlands, Cape Town.

Rate: R595 per night

Amma Cottage Scarborough

Location: Scarborough

Bedrooms: 0 (Bed 1) / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: This is a tiny tumbleweed house. The concept was to build something tucked among the rocks and established natural vegetation. The perfect place to retreat to with a pile of books.

Rate: R548 per night

Cape Town Centre Penthouse

Location: Cape Town CBD

Bedrooms: 2 / Bathrooms: 1.5

Host Description: Modern 170m² penthouse in historic Cape Town. Coffee shops, museums and theatre within walking distance. Best views of Lion’s Head and city from the 17th floor covered terrace and braai area.

Rate: R2 337 per night

Amazing House on the Beach

Location: Klein Slangkop

Bedrooms: 4 / Bathrooms: 4

Host Description: Modern wood and glass home on the beach. Breathtaking location in a private security estate. Heated pool.

Rate: R5 055 per night

Leafy, Central Studio Apartment

Location: Tamboerskloof

Bedrooms: 0 (Beds 2) / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: Self-catering studio apartment with all the essentials. Attached to our family home, but with private entrance and garden; it is walking distance to trendy Kloof Street, mountain hikes and a great deli.

Rate: R1 205 per night

Design Loft With industrial Chic

Location: Salt River

Bedrooms: 0 (Beds 1) / Bathrooms: 1

Host Description: This modern city loft not only offers stunning views to Table Mountain, it also makes you feel at home and comfortable with its carefully selected interiors.

Rate: R1 581 per night

View more listings at airbnb.com.

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