Waterberg, South Africa
Hidden amidst the dense trees of a private reserve in Waterberg, South Africa, is a long, narrow building, designed by Johannesburg-based architecture studio Frankie Pappas that appears to grow from a steep cliff out into the treetops.
Ant Vervoort of Frankie Pappas was recently awarded a 2020 Europe 40 Under 40® Award from The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies and The Chicago Athenaeum.
Crafted from local brick that evokes the sandstone rock face and capped with a green roof, the House of the Tall Chimneys is a guesthouse that celebrates a visceral connection with nature.
The building is organized as a long thin building that allows it to fit snugly between the forest trees; the two chimneys are essential to the structure of the building and naturally ventilate the bedroom.
This building attempts to touch the earth only where necessary; this allows for the ground below the bedroom to be completely accessible by kudu and leopard, and wildebeest while the roof creates additional habitat for vervet monkeys, genets, and baboons.
The building offers its inhabitants a bathroom with private views out over the planted courtyard, the bedroom, and the private lounge.
The originating idea was to root the bathroom into the rockscape whilst allowing the bedroom to float amongst the trees.
The cliff-side of the building comprises structural brickwork. Structural brick chimneys are then also built in the riverine forest portion of the site; this creates two structural elements between which we can span a timber bedroom.
The entire house is off-the-grid.
Water from the planted roofs is collected and filtered through the forest.
Architects: Frankie Pappas International
Builder: Lionhearted
Photography: Dook for Visi
