Table of contents for VISI 114 in Visi

’VE FALLEN IN LOVE WITH COLOUR. Hard to believe, given that my monochromatic personal wardrobe and home-decor aesthetic (beyond the odd bright splash of the Barbara Hepworth print behind me) have usually followed a neutral palette. As it did for many, that all changed over the last year. After enduring months of lockdown, and the social, economic and emotional pressures brought about by the pandemic, we’ve shared a global chrysalis moment. I’ve felt a natural pull towards the positivity and encouragement of colour. It feels stridently forward-looking – and a crucial energy to tap into as the world rejuvenates and reinvents itself. A lot of that reinvention went into our homes: the place where we spent so much time both working and living. Lockdown was also an unexpected but wonderful…

Despite ours being a nation in lockdown and in mourning, I can’t seem to quell this insatiable desire to leave home for a bit, and explore a world that, until a year ago, was just an easy, albeit pricey, return flight away. I can’t help but be envious of the seemingly frequent announcements of friends and colleagues sharing the start of new chapters. Three have relocated to the Netflix headquarters in Amsterdam; another is selling her home to start an interior-design business in Rotterdam; industry peers are emigrating to Ireland; a friend has decided to give up her apartment and live a nomadic existence for the rest of the year… Quietly, late at night, I scroll through LinkedIn to self-soothe and see whether there might be a gap for me…

“There are 360 degrees. Why stick to one?” said the late starchitect Zaha Hadid – and this philosophy could well describe Mica and Marcel Angel’s Llandudno home. At its entrance, concrete slabs suspended over a body of water deliver you to a pair of angular, concrete planes that defy gravity as they slant casually skywards. The entrance is straddled by two linear concrete boxes, one of which is home to an outsized sculptural staircase that runs the full height of the double-volume space. It’s an astonishing first impression. But then this home is designed to marry not just the disparate aesthetic predilections of its owners – an aspiring clinical psychologist and a racing driver – but also the splendour of its setting. Set on giant granite boulders between Llandudno and…

It has been a 21-year-long labour of love. Marti Heyns-Foster admits that, when she first moved into her corner home on a shaded street in the Winelands, it wasn’t her dream abode. But it had good bones, high ceilings, original wooden floors and plenty of natural light, and the young mother knew she could work with the basics. Over the following two decades, with her sharp eye for the quirky and the unique, Marti lovingly curated a sanctuary filled with French-inspired decor and objets. “In my opinion, a home should evolve over time, reflecting your changing tastes as you develop as person,” she says. “A real home is a representation of how all the members of the household live and grow.” The property is set far back from public view,…

The Urbanative’s founder, designer Mpho Vackier, says the Covid-19 pandemic led to a worldwide rediscovery of what home means to people. As a result, her design firm’s Homecoming collection was not just an exploration of colour, materials and form: it also included an olfactory experience through a set of collaborative candles with Okra Candle. We spoke to her about the new range. Do you picture the pieces in the Homecoming collection being used to create a complete look, or do you see people adding one or two items to an existing scheme? There are 24 individual pieces in the collection, and they can fill a room or simply add to it. We explored categories of products seen in our previous collections, such as seating and storage – but we also…

“ It took a lot of time and experimenting to understand how cork really works,” says Laurie Wiid van Heerden, explaining his journey towards creating the wide range of unique contemporary cork products that his studio has designed to date. “To fully understand this unique material, I travelled to Portugal often, visiting cork factories and the beautiful cork forests. I quickly became aware of its wonderful properties and manufacturing capabilities, and realised I wanted to place my focus on cork and make it one of our core materials.” When Laurie describes cork as “unique”, he’s not exaggerating: as he points out, this remarkable material is biodegradable, renewable, recyclable, reusable, lightweight, waterproof, elastic, compressible and resistant to wear and tear. It’s also immensely versatile. When using the material as a designer,…

THULI LUBISI This talented printmaker’s graphic works are a celebration of both her cultural background and her craft. Why abstract art? While I was a student at Artist Proof Studio, most students and graduates did realistic artworks. When I got to third year, I told myself that I wanted to move away from the traditional way of printmaking, which led me to explore and combine different techniques and elements when printing, resulting in abstract works. Career highlights? Having my artworks commissioned for various projects, most notably the recently completed Leonardo building in Sandton, and exhibiting at art fairs while I was still a student. Creative people who inspire you? Designer Laduma Ngxokolo and artist Esther Mahlangu. Although each focuses on his or her own tribe, I love the aesthetics found…

Antelo’s owners Carin and Pietie Nelson have a wealth of knowledge when it comes to the local manufacturing industry, and have used their love of nature, the outdoors and classic simplicity to inspire their chic designs. “We want to keep it simple and classic, with a focus on contributing to the local economy, job creation and skills development,” says Carin when asked about their brand’s identity. “In 2015 – by complete coincidence – my childhood dream of owning my own fashion lifestyle brand became a reality when, while I was searching for potential suppliers on Google, a classified ad popped up saying ‘Leather goods factory for sale in Cape Town’,” she says. “It immediately grabbed my attention. The business was called Antelo Collections; within a few days, we bought the…

1. The Plant Hemisphere hanging pot evokes nostalgia for your gran’s veranda, but adds a fresh twist in the form of a powder-coated stainless-steel finish in 12 cool colours. The leather straps are adjustable in length too, which is handy. From R695 | pedersenlennard.co.za 2. The earthy and understated Terra planter caters for the slightly smaller end of the pot spectrum. It’s ideal for topping a server or a bookshelf, and available in a variety of colours, from Spice (seen here) to Ebony and Coconut. R1 680 | douglasanddouglas.co.za 3. Joe Paine’s striking Galapagos is planter and sculpture combined. With a built-in trellis (useful if you’re short on wall space), this piece can transform an unremarkable room into something special. R8 700 | joepaine.com 4. Laurie Wiid van Heerden from…

GINA DIONISIO, VISI DIGITAL EDITOR Winter is here. How do you plan to celebrate “hibernation season” this year? I definitely won’t be hibernating – I’ll be battling the wind, rain and cold (and probably questioning my life choices!) while I train for the Ultra-trail Cape Town 65km event that takes place in November. “I’ve spent the past 13 years in the media industry. I started as an intern at another local decor and design magazine, and I was hooked,” says Gina. And although she loves print as much as we do, she eventually made the move to the digital space, where her focus at the moment is digital marketing and e-commerce. Before she joined the VISI team in early 2021, Gina was living her “best fitness life” as the digital…

Hibernation – it discomforts me. It implies Do Not Disturb signs, irritable bears and gross strategies against digestion. (Care to guess what a tappen might be?) Hibernation has the sense of something to be endured behind a knockout sleep that may as well be a self-induced coma. A strategy for surviving a hostile season. But that’s not our winter – not even where I live, in Simon’s Town, where in winter the sun tends to retreat for days on end, and the clouds settle halfway down the mountains. And that’s not us, not my clever species that can’t close the curtains and draw near to the fire and sit for more than a minute before it is reaching for the crochet hook or the picture book, or the pipe or…

Located less than a minute from Plettenberg Bay’s pristine Keurbooms lagoon, this newly built home combines beach-holiday practicality with elegant design. It’s a place where sandy feet and effortless glamour combine – and a product of an excellent client-architect relationship. From the start, says architect Luis Mira, he and the client were in complete agreement about what sort of house was needed. The brief was to create a holiday home over two levels with “a roof terrace, where the main lounge, dining and kitchen would be elevated to maximise views”, says Luis. The client, he adds, “had a clear diagram of how they envisioned this, and we loved that starting point”. The end result is a striking home on multiple levels, with sculptural staircases and a boldly celebrated support pillar…

Re-imagined via an aesthetic dialogue between virtuoso architects Jun Aoki and Peter Marino, Louis Vuitton Ginza Namiki has become a new, naturalistic tower that inspires wonder both outside and within. Located on the corner site that has been occupied by Louis Vuitton since 1981, the building evokes reflections of water, with smooth, undulating surfaces – from the glass façade that transmits shifting colour to the show-stopping staircase – throughout. Composed of two layers of glass, Jun Aoki’s façade is, he says, his representation of a “pillar of water.” Almost seamless, the outer panes curve and ripple, with their mesmerising, three-dimensional surface enhanced by a dichroic film that produces endless colour variations. Inside, Peter Marino’s interior design emphasises the building’s organic aesthetic with a central staircase that unfurls like a ribbon…

Aweh Migo – aka Garth Wareley – has been a muralist for just shy of two decades, and recently spent four days in De Doorns with his brother, Matthew, documenting the process of creating Soar. “VKDB Architects hit me up about the space at De Doorns Primary School – and I appreciate that they trusted me with this awesome project,” says Aweh Migo. “It’s also the first piece I’ve produced for the Western Cape Education Department, so I’m pretty proud and really stoked with the outcome!” The mural’s content emerged from a drawing workshop the muralist had recently attended with Nathen Mayne, who is an associate professor in astrophysics and planetary climates at the University of Exeter in the UK. “Professor Mayne got me looking into the climates of various…

SOME OF THE THINGS I THOUGHT WERE IMPORTANT FADED INTO THE BACKGROUND. Covid-19 entered our lives in such a shocking way. You’d have had to be a complete pessimist to believe that, with all the medical advancement our time is known for, anything could disrupt an entire way of existing in the 21st century. Yet we were all forced into quasi-hibernation as the global pandemic continued to be relentless. It also reminded us of the glaring disparities between those who wield power and privilege, and those who do not. As a writer, I was privileged to finally sit down and face my incomplete projects, one of them very close to my heart – a manuscript of poems from all over the world that I compiled and edited. Wild (Im)perfections: A…

If you’re looking for the architecture and design equivalent of “never judge a book by its cover”, this apartment in the Onyx must be it. Its white-accented black-mirror façade and similarly themed foyer and corridors provide little hint of the explosion of neon that awaits when you step into Gavin Hendricks’s apartment in this Cape Town Foreshore building. It didn’t start out this way, though. The apartment was purchased renovated and, according to interior designer Etienne Hanekom, “The palette was quite stark and lacking in personality, but it wasn’t really a blank canvas. There were many black walls and finishes that we couldn’t ignore. Strong lines dominated the space, as did the use of white, light grey and black.” That would’ve been fine for a corporate apartment, but Gavin wanted…

MICHAEL MABUTI AND SUSAN CHUNG HAVE A KNACK for creating good-looking homes that reflect their passion for design. They have renovated three to date, and their fourth property – purchased a few days after they happened to visit the park nearby – was just the challenge they were looking for. The 1887 cottage in an inner-Melbourne suburb needed a lot of work, but they loved its historic beauty and could see the potential. “With our background in building and design, we’re always searching for the worst house on the best street in order to evolve it,” says Michael, founder and director of construction company Seventy7 Projects. Soon after purchasing the home in 2012, they commenced a brief renovation – a new kitchen and rewiring, plus upgraded bathrooms – before moving…

The pandemic, the lockdown and particularly the work-from-home phenomenon have prompted many of us to reconsider what we want and need from our home. “The refurb of this house was done during lockdown,” says interior designer Julia Day of Julia Day Interior Architecture and Design. Pre-pandemic, it had been more neutral and subdued – a calming sanctuary to soothe the senses and provide respite from the stresses and strains of corporate life. Lockdown, however, demanded something different. “I think, during that period, people felt an urge to create their own stories,” says Julia. Rather than neutrality, home needed to provide an “emotive response”. The sense of vibrancy and glamour we might normally seek elsewhere needed to infuse our personal spaces. After all, Julia adds, “We weren’t getting it anywhere else.”…

South African artist Georgina Gratrix was born in Mexico City. She’s known for her highly expressive paintings, which feature bold, impasto brushwork and frequently evoke strong emotions. “The Reunion: Georgina Gratrix”, her memorable recent exhibition at Norval Foundation, was the artist’s first solo retrospective at a museum – an impressive achievement, as she is not yet 40 – and was curated by guest curator Liese van der Watt. The exhibition featured work from 2011 to 2020 in three distinct groups: portraits of friends and family, including self-portraits; still lifes; and portraits of contemporary social figures. You incorporate multiplicity in some of your portraits, indicating different dimensions to individuals. Is this something you’ve observed in your subjects? How does it inform your perspective on relationships? I think this is particularly evident…

Studio Toogood – long known for the earthy, chunky, organic feel of its furniture designs – recently produced a clean-lined, unisex clothing collection, and collaborated with footwear brand Birkenstock on a range of covetable shoes. Now, the studio is moving into homeware and decor pieces. According to the brand, the new Dough collection is named “to highlight the common ground of kneading in both baking and pottery”, and includes six key pieces: a mug, a jug, a platter, a bowl, a vase and a centrepiece. Hand-shaped in the Toogood studio before being cast in earthenware, the pieces share a pared-back yet playful simplicity: the mugs and pitchers boast chunky handles, while the platter has a rounded quality that calls to mind – of course – rising dough. The vase and…

1. LIVING IN NATURE: CONTEMPORARY HOUSES IN THE NATURAL WORLD Edited by Phaidon Phaidon | R885 Featuring 50 architect-designed houses that all demonstrate a special relationship with the natural world, Living In Nature’s pages showcase contemporary homes chosen for their combination of unique design and stunning location. The houses are shown in photographs of both exteriors and interiors that display the unique connection each has with its surroundings. 2. POSTCARDS FROM HOME: CREATIVITY IN A TIME OF CRISIS By the editors of Vogue Rizzoli | R727 As the world went into lockdown in March 2020, Vogue asked some of its collaborators – including Virgil Abloh, Cindy Sherman and Tracee Ellis Ross – to create images that reflected their new reality. The intimate portraits and personal essays were shared in the…

Celebrated with a beautiful shoot that instantly caught the VISI team’s collective eye, Haldane Martin’s fresh take on outdoor furniture is, he says, “a new direction”. “This shoot is a culmination of about two or three years of work – and the realisation of my purpose,” he says. We asked him to tell us more about the new designs. Why outdoor furniture? Designing outdoor furniture feels like the final bolt’s gone in, bringing everything together. HALDANE is now a culmination of my personal life, interests and design work. The lines and shapes of these pieces have a relaxed, never-hard-edged feel. Was designing in this way a conscious choice? Every collection demands its own aesthetic. But, as a brand, we definitely use curvature to accentuate the friendliness of the furniture. We…

Celeste and Alain Ferrier had their child in August 2019, then rapidly experienced a pandemic and lockdown with their little one – a time during which “the importance of child development and the role that space performs in this were revealed to us,” says Celeste. And so they set out to design and manufacture kid-friendly products for the home, while aligning this with their belief that sustainability and environmental awareness are key to preserving our planet for the benefit of everyone’s children. The result is BenBen: a collection of fun, functional objects for kids that range from adorable height charts to playful clocks – including one shaped like a fried egg that we think a lot of adults will covet for their kitchens – and charming night lights. The delightful…

How does an eight-litre water fount with drinking capacity for 100 feathered friends become a romantic outdoor-dinner light for lovebirds? Simply remove the domed lid from the interlocking base, fix an adhesive, battery-operated touch light to the centre of the base, return the lid, interlock again – and hang it anywhere you like.…