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NOTHING GIVES ME HOPE LIKE seeing something new. Coming across a piece of design be it architecture, interiors, art or even tech — that has a fresh take on what's gone before is genuinely thrilling. And what makes it particularly thrilling is that it's not like everything else we see is uniformly boring. On the contrary — the ideas and designs that regularly land on our desks are of such a high quality that it makes choosing what we're going to focus on in each issue of VISI a wonderfully tough task. But then we see the first images of our shoot at Jao Camp in the Okavango (page 66), where not only is everything recycled, reclaimed or handmade, but it's been moulded and shaped into organic forms that make…

IN SEVERAL INTERVIEWS, the American collage, drawing and installation artist Kara Walker calls herself and her creative process an “unreliable narrator”. In this embodiment, facts of history can easily become fiction. Walker pulls the rug from under the feet of factually stifling history and, as it falls, she creates black vector-like cut-outs of paper to mimic what she has read in books, novels and historical accounts. In this way, she unburdens herself and her work from specific dates, times and contexts while simultaneously immersing us into other dimensions or parallel universes that mirror ours. The semblance of familiarity becomes the only anchor that roots us in reality. This form of engagement pixellates reality. We are forced to step back as though to look at a pointillist painting. Standing too close…

KPM HOTEL Set within the grounds of the 250-year-old Royal Porcelain Manufactory Berlin (Königliche PorzellanManufaktur), this slick new hotel belies its historical address. The ultra-modern building, made up of futuristic-looking interlocking steel cubes with floor-to-ceiling windows, has already picked up several design and architecture prizes since opening. While the rooms and shared guest, spaces are minimalist, understated and achingly chic, they also give more than a passing nod to their location, with handmade porcelain sculptures making a cool - yes, really! - statement throughout. The rooftop terrace offers soaring views - and Tiergarten, Berlin's largest park, is a few minutes' walk away. kpmhotel WILMINA This addition to Berlin's dynamic hotel landscape is a sensitive restoration and reinvention of a former courthouse and women's prison in a 19th-century listed building in…

VISI Monteleone Apartment THE SMALL AND PICTURESQUE MEDIEVAL TOWN OF MONTELEONE D'ORVIETO is perched on a hill in Italy's Umbria region — the green heart of Italy. Immersed in the area's natural geography of luxuriant woods and olive groves, lively streams and soft countryside, it's a peaceful paradise tucked away from the tourist hordes. In one of the town's small alleys, Italian-born and Chicago-based architect Patrizio Fradiani of Studio F Design, and his husband Mark, have restored an apartment in a 15th-century palazzo. Abandoned for 40 years, the apartment clearly showed signs of decay, and the entrance had been closed with a heavy metal door. It was as if someone had dined and left right afterwards, leaving everything as it was: the entire apartment, its furniture, tableware, plates and cutlery…

IN TUSCANY, ONE CENTURY SEEMS TO BLEND INTO THE NEXT. Who hasn't dreamt of lingering in the land of the Renaissance, between cypresses, olive trees and rose gardens? In the off-season, mist-enveloped panoramas dominate the countryside and, standing on the hillside that is home to the Podere Bussolaio estate,you look out at a landscape that's changed little over the past five centuries. Nestled among the orchards of Travalle, the original estate was built in the 15th century for the wealthy Strozzi family of Florence. Today, the 700m2 property is the home of two sisters involved in the fashion industry, Elisa and Claudia, and their families. This made for an interesting brief to the architects. There's tight bond between the families, but also a need for independence. And while both shared…

BRYANSTON(2020) This interior (above left) was completed while lockdown restrictions were in place. It helped me connect with a sentiment I never appreciated before - being able to look forward to something. There was so little we could look forward to in that moment! I realised that we give clients a sense of anticipation; we not only convey beauty, but also a sense of hope and joy. This beautiful home, layered with luxurious textures, became the ideal lockdown cocoon. RUSTENBURG (2022) My team took over the design of this entire scheme (above right), including the floors, lighting, ceilings, bathrooms and furniture. The project took more than three years to complete, and was quite challenging - but the result is a striking, calm aesthetic with rich, warm tones and textures. STEYN…

While lead singer Morten Harket had to bang his head repeatedly against the panels of his comic-strip confinement and basically rip apart the fabric of time and space to exit the monochrome world, all you have to do to enter this one is open the front door. Located in Doha's Lusail Marina Food Arena, the Ink Café's black-and-white decor is all about optical illusion as 2Dinspired pen-drawn cartoons mess with your 3D world. The white interior is a canvas for trompe I'oeil trickery disguised among actual tables, chairs and mugs that will have you reaching for something only Morten could grab. That famous music video, by the way, was created using a technique called rotoscoping, which is basically tracing I animation over live-action footage. Animators Michael Patterson and Candace Reckinger…

ACCORDING TO THE INTERNET, a pen collector is not called a penophile. Nor a penniseur. “Pen fanatic” is the closest we came to finding a term for the hobby - but even that doesn't feel like it holds enough weight. Pen collecting, and putting in the time to physically pen something, really is a lost art - but it appears to be resurging. A report released by PR Newswire shows that there is growing consumer interest in luxury writing products, with the global luxury pens market valued at $2.251-billion in 2020 and projected to reach almost $3.3-billion by 2028. The most prolific pen collectors are based in the US (where they have no less than 10 pen conferences annually) and Europe. Australia, Japan and the UK are also home to…

 BABYLONSTOREN SPRANKEL You'll first love the bottle, featuring artwork by Peet Pienaar - but this beauty of a Blanc de Blancs made from 100% Chardonnay is brimming with a bouquet of bright apple and biscuity brioche. Serve it at a winelands table, with smoked Franschhoek trout. R635 | babylonstoren.com  DELAIRE GRAFF SUNRISE BRUT To make this corker of a Cap Classique, winemaker Morné Vrey of the elegant, art-filled Delaire Graff estate on Helshoogte Pass, took inspiration from the Loire Valley. The result is a supremely elegant blend of Chenin Blanc, Chardonnay and Cabernet Franc. R460 | delaire.co.za SILVERTHORN RIVER DRAGON Winemaker John Loubser breaks with convention in the latest from his Breede River cellar. Made from Colombar and fermented with wild yeast in old, 500-litre acacia-wood barrels, the River Dragon…

DANIELLE WEAKLEY, JOURNALIST What is your most valued heirloom? My grandmother loved to travel, and to shop on those travels, and in the 1950s she found herself an enormous, intricately carved Chinese kist. Obviously, she had to have it, despite the deep impracticality of lugging a kist across the seas, by boat, back to South Africa. That kist remained a bone of contention and family legend - so, of course, I had to have it too! It's not just a remarkably well-travelled piece of furniture and a ridiculously beautiful example of craftsmanship; it's also wrapped up in my memories, first at my grandparents' house, and now with its pride of place in my own entrance hall. Those punks of mine better fi ght over it when the time comes… Read…

SO OFTEN CITED, AND SO SELDOM finished. All anyone ever remembers about Proust's Á La Recherche du Temps Perdu (In Search of Lost Time) is its “madeleine moment”, when the taste of a tea-soaked miniature sponge cake unlocked vivid recall of hitherto inaccessible past events and feelings. Well, actually, let me not speak for other people. That is all I remember about this seven-volume opus. It has defeated me more than once and, having tried (and failed) yet again to get through it during the last lockdown, I am now resigned to living with this intellectual lacuna. Fortunately, the bit about the biscuit crops up early on, so even I have read that part relatively recently. We have all had some version of the Proust effect, within which involuntary memories…

ANT THINKS MIES VAN DER ROHE'S FARNSWORTH House is really bad architecture. There, he's said it. And don't even get him started on Le Corbusier, Michelangelo and Walter Gropius. ”Mies van der Rohe was more interested in how steel met glass than how the sun worked or music sounded, how rivers flooded, or how life was lived,“ says Ant, alluding to the Farnsworth House's multiple floodings since its completion in 1951. ”Almost the entire tradition of Western formal architecture has produced sculpture, rather than architecture - and then celebrated the individual as genius. Architecture lost its way a long time ago, and it now sits somewhere between artistic expression, egotistical pursuit and stylish endeavour. We should be building a remarkable future - not architecture for fancy f*****g photos.” In fact,…

HAILED AS A NATIONAL TREASURE when he passed away in 2010, Robert Hodgins continues to loom large in the imagination of many who knew him, including collaborators, collectors, students and readers of his penetrating art criticism. This premier evening sale will be held on 9 November 2022, and will conclude Strauss & Co's programme for Johannesburg Auction Week. Comprised of some 40 lots, many from the estate of the late Robert Hodgins and fresh to market, the sale's title, “Three Robs: Artist, Collaborator, Friend” alludes to the multifaceted character of this influential artist. In addition to a number of oils executed in Hodgins's characteristically vivid colour palette, the sale will include rare watercolours. monotypes, pastels and drawings. These works affirm his bold expressionist style and colourist manners, and reveal his…

VISI | Steenberg Home THERE ARE HOUSES IN BEAUTIFUL SETTINGS THAT TRY TO DISAPPEAR into the landscape. Others like to perch on a prominent spot and lord over all they survey. This one — a holiday home on a big semi-rural plot on the side of the Steenberg mountains in Cape Town — does neither. Its weighty walls and solid masses seem to emerge from the ground and assert themselves unapologetically on the mountainside, yet the indigenous gardens around its edges blend with the natural fynbos, so it looks as if it is being reclaimed by nature. It is undeniably there, but somehow doesn't seem like an imposition. Parts of it form big, monolithic blocks, and others are almost pavilion-like - glass-sided, so you can see all the way through…

VISI Bo-Kaap Hotel * “OUR QUEEN IS DEAD. LONG LIVE OUR QUEEN.” The announcement on @dorphotel of the unexpected death of its creator was a hammer to the heart for her followers. Gail Behr, the maverick hotelier who worked with fabrics and plants like artists do with paint, an impresario who conjured up a theatre-like experience on the terraced garden carved into Signal Hill, was gone. Gail was extraordinary. A hotelier who never really wanted guests — “cluttering the pink floral sofas with their turquoise bunny jackets” — she reluctantly opened her compound of Georgian-inspired buildings at the end of 2019. No-one could believe it hadn't been there forever, that she designed and built it from scratch within a few years, using doors and windows purloined from demolition sites to…

HE ULTRA-COOL SERIES OF RUGS that now electrify the living spaces of the exclusive Molori Safari in the North West's Madikwe Game Reserve originated in the height of Covid. It was during the constrained days of early lockdown that Megan Hesse and Andrea Kleinloog of design outfit Hesse Kleinloog decided it was time to create carpets as part of the interior revamp they were doing at the bush escape. Not long into the refit, the team realised that round statement rugs would be a brilliant addition to the space. They'd work with the bones of the place, and complement the artworks going into the lodge from owner Ivor Ichikowitz's impressive art collection. But round rugs are hard to get at the best of times in South Africa, let alone during…

HRISTINE GOOSEN IS THE FOUNDER of sustainable furniture-design business, Jacobs Collection - an architecturally inspired brand that celebrates functionality, beautiful simplicity and contemporary design Jacobs Collection's latest offering, Felt(veld)scape I, is an artwork that investigates the desire to return to the utopia of childhood, and explores the longing to reconnect with one's landscape and heritage. It was first showcased at Investec Cape Town Art Fair earlier this year, and then as part of Southern Guild gallery's “Spring Awakening” exhibition. Felt(vetd)scape I was created by felting Merino sheep wool, with the fibres matted by hand to create the undulating forms of the design. My typical day consists of a lot of multitasking. There are many facets of the business that need my full attention, and it's the details that count. Whether…

CINEPHILES MAY RECOGNISE these intricately patterned coverings from Marvel's Black Panther film, but Basotho blankets - and their maker, Aranda - were a household name with deep significance long before Hollywood came calling. Started in 1953 by the Magni family, and located in Randfontein outside Johannesburg, the Aranda Textile Mill is the oldest blanket, throw and shawl manufacturer in South Africa. They source raw materials locally and internationally, and spin them into yarns, which are dyed, woven and made into an array of brilliant products. They're especially known for their range of heritage blankets, including the Ingcawe, a Xhosa blanket traditionally used for burial and initiation; the Umbhalo, a striped blanket worn by the Ndebele people; and, significantly, the Basotho blanket. With permission from the Basotho royal family, Aranda has…

TUCKED INTO THE HOUT BAY HILLS, Future Found Sanctuary is a luxury retreat designed to transport you from the rat race to a space that nurtures and awakens your weary soul. Founded by brand builder Jim Brett, the private escape intends to provide guests with a transformational stay that evokes a sense of wonder, thought and quiet contemplation through design and experiences. Local architecture and interior design studio Ohkre Collective, headed by Phillip Nel, was commissioned to build the development's new Fitness Centre and Sensorium Spa, forming part of Jim's vision for an immersive and wholesome holistic retreat. Phillip's team had to transform the back-of-house utility area that had serviced the villa into a rejuvenating space that reflects nature and calms guests seeking to escape the urban frazzle of day-to-day…

THERE'S NO DEFINITIVE ORIGIN STORY HERE, but legend has it that it was that great bearded Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II who was possibly the earliest - and certainly the most famous - purveyor of house plants. To please his Persian wife, Amytis, darling Nebbie created a lush, green indoor-outdoor oasis in about 600 BC - a Wonder of the Ancient World we know as the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. Turning our gaze to more modern times, the house plant in its various incarnations has gone on to become a favoured interior staple… 18th CENTURY According to the UK National Trust - the organisation entrusted with preserving the United Kingdom's places of natural beauty and historic interest - 18th century cabinet makers produced tiered wire and iron plant stands specifically to…

IS THE UNITED NATIONS' INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF GLASS. Who knew? For this unexpected celebration, the global organisation has hailed the material's countless uses - from the optical fibres that keep the internet going to storing Covid vaccines. Glass sheets are essential to solar cells; telescope glass optics help scientists study the universe; and, of course, there's glass art and its ability to show the full colour spectrum. Thousands of events are planned internationally to mark the year - and until late October, two exhibitions highlighting local glass art are on in Pretoria, at the Pretoria Art Museum and St Lorient Fashion & Art Gallery, iyog2022.org IT'S ALL IN THE PAST Glass is integral to technology today, but the sand-based material has a long history. There is naturally occurring volcanic glass…

I GREW UP ALONG THE Namibian coastline. I learnt to fish there, learnt to cook and hunt and play there. It was through fishing — and through his back-yard hydroponics (we lived in a desert) — that my dad introduced me to food and cooking without even realising it. The fires on the beach, the frequent braais and the cooking of what we had caught all taught me so much. When I was a kid, summer weekends meant long days spent at the beach. The wind and shade cloths would be put up, the umbrellas pitched, the fires made. One thing I remember very clearly, besides the fishing, is the sand. The combination of the hot desert sun and the wind would cause it to form a thick crust, sometimes…

SAN FRANCISCO'S DNA runs through every bottle of SKYY Vodka. Crafted by a diverse collective of experts - including a water sommelier, a chemist and a professional bartender - SKYY Vodka represents the forward-thinking mind-set of the coastal city it originates from. First launched in 1992, today the premium American-made spirit is evolving its liquid for a new generation of vodka drinkers. SKYY's unique filtration method is what sets the award-winning tipple apart from other brands: it's quadrupledistilled and triple-filtered through California limestone, and is now made with water enriched by minerals - including Pacific minerals that are sourced directly in the San Francisco Bay Area. This process enhances the liquid's smooth mouthfeel and fresh taste, and adds character to any cocktail experience. This filtration method is also used to…

VISI | Okavango Delta Lodge “Architect Silvio Rech drew a giraffe into the interior elevation of the gallery building t p illustrate the scale,“ expains Jao Camp owner Cathy Kays. ”We decided this was just what the space needed! We had heard that a full-grown bull giraffe had been killed fighting another bull on a game farm. We acquirer a permit for the remains, and had them preserved and bleached in Johannesburg before they were returned an assembled at Jao.” AN ELEPHANT DRINKS FROM THE SWAMP AS A CROCODILE CRUISES by, only its beady eyes giving away its presence. A mother and father hippo protect their calf below the surface as a mokoro is expertly steered between the swishing reeds. A lilac-breasted roller flies overhead, displaying its rainbow-like plumage. It's…

VISI | Umdloti Home It was a serendipitous Sunday drive that delivered the current owners to this prime property in Umdloti, They were met by spectacular views out towards the local surf break, and a 400-year old milkwood standing sentinel in the front garden. “We had been thinking about buying a home in Umdloti for a while, so to happen upon this place without trying too hard felt like the realisation of a dream,” they say. Although the couple live full time on a farm on the North Coast, the family have a long association with Umdloti, dating back to the early 1900s, when a great-grandfather lived there. “We have great memories of the times we spent here over the years, and we wanted to emulate that with our own…

A RCHBISHOP DESMOND TUTU famously described the Africa Centre, in its original location in Covent Garden, as a hub for “all who are Africans, and all those who have a care for the interests of the continent and its people.” It was opened by Zambia's first president, Kenneth Kaunda, This new iteration is the design brainchild of London's Freehaus architects and interior designer Tola Ojuolape. The welcoming spaces they've fashioned include the Malangatana Lounge, named for the acclaimed Mozambican artist and a mural of his that was removed off the stairwell wall in the old centre, and now has pride in 1964, and for decades was an important place to meet, party and talk politics for people a long way from their homes dotted across our vast continent. Many South…

THE BASICS The Carlton office tower reaches a height of 223m above Main Street's pavement. Designed by New York architecture firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), the sprawling Carlton Centre complex in downtown Johannesburg was a flagship development for Anglo American and SAB. Planning for the mammoth project began in the early 1960s, when a land parcel spanning five city blocks was secretly assembled. The centre was designed to include a 50-storey international-style office tower, the 31-floor Western International Carlton Hotel - the largest in the southern hemisphere - an underground arcade housing 160 highend boutique stores, and a 2000 car parkade with an exhibition space. The scheme clustered around an open. New York-esque plaza, with a central oculus to the shopping levels below. NOT MANY PEOPLE KNOW THAT… Western's…

AT ONE TIME, COROMANDEL MANOR was the stuff of architectural legend - a multi-millionaire's 70s stone home on a farm between Dullstroom and Lydenburg. It was a long, low building, with narrow wings interlayered with planted courtyards, a series of bold buttresses and a planted roof; at once exotic - built by a foreign architect - and a high-water mark of “regional modernism”. It looked like nothing else on the architectural scene: unmistakably modern, but strangely timeless; alien, but somehow at one with its surroundings. Yet, for years, this remarkable project went under the radar, says Edna Peres, co-author of Creating Coromandel, a new book that finally attempts to give the house and its architect their due. The house was commissioned by Sydney Press, founder of clothing retail giant Edgars,…