concept & vision

a residential building in Johannesburg, South Africa, DRIVELINES studios is located in Maboneng, an area of recent urban transformation and renewal that responds to the post-apartheid generation’s desire to repopulate the city’s downtown through new models of urban living

design & architecture

embracing the triangular geometry of the site, the building is conceived as a billboard where two separate volumes of residential units are hinged at the narrow east end of the lot, framing the social space of the open interior courtyard. As in a billboard, the building outer facades are straight and flush with the lot line while the facades in the inner courtyard are articulated by stairs and elevator, and by the open circulation activated by the units spillover onto their outdoor space. The thin residential volumes offer cross lighting and passive ventilation to each unit, plus outdoor space to socialize

impact & significance

we centered the life around the shared, open space of the courtyard with a small pool and a brai/bbq for the community. All the units outdoor spaces faced this shared area. We reused 140 containers sourced from City Deep, the dry container port less than a mile from the site. The modular, steel construction saved water, plus window cutouts were reused as structural reinforcements