Contact Artefacts
please if you have any comments or more information regarding this record.
Menu
HomeUpfront
Now Up
Books
Towns
Structures
People
Firms
Lexicon
House Goodman
Hyde Park, Johannesburg, Gauteng
Michael Kidd SUTTON: Design Architect
 |  |  |  |  |
Contact Artefacts | MenuHomeUpfront Now Up Books Towns Structures People Firms Lexicon | House Goodman Michael Kidd SUTTON: Design Architect | | ||||||
| |||||||||
Click to view map Coordinates: | Linda and Tony Goodman (of the Goodman Galleries) had bought a site of a solid rock outcrop, thus the house required no foundations, being built directly on the ground rock, following the contours of the rock face. Its inspiration lay in the ruins of Great Zimbabwe, the brick color chosen to resemble the stones of which this had been constructed (Sutton, 2015:24). Unusual design uses a traditional material A large rocky outcrop, covering about 75% of the site, was the major influence in establishing the shape, form and colour of this new home belonging to Mr. & Mrs. A. Goodman in the suburb of Hyde Park, Johannesburg. A secondary but most important consideration, deriving from their intellectual and artistic approach to life, was that the owners required their home to serve not merely as a place in which to live but also as a private gallery where their own large collection of paintings and sculpture could be displayed in addition to pieces for exhibition, pieces which could under such circumstances be shown to select and exclusive gatherings. While the exterior form of the house is related to its interior function, no conscious style was attempted. The varying heights of the parapet walls, the colour and texture of the bricks, the accentuated curves and the shadowy recesses were all consciously used to express a formalisation of the rock form on which the house rests. The undeniable hint of Zimbabwe is, according to the architect, merely an organic result of this attempt and was by no means a preconception of the design. The primeval shape, however, adds to the building an air of bastion-like strength which only helps in achieving the rock-like character aimed at by the architect. The walls of the house, which were built without concrete foundations, were allowed to follow where possible the contours of the rocks, thus forming what might almost be described as a haphazard series of irregularly shaped areas and rooms, which present an interesting organisation of interior spaces with walls running at various and different angles. No part of the building is either regular or formal in shape; walls snake hither and thither presenting a multitude of faces, recesses and nooks on which to either hang pictures or in which to harbour pieces of sculpture. The walls are broken only here and there by narrow, vertical floor-to-ceiling openings, strategically placed, however, to afford the best possible distribution of daylight onto the works of art. Certain darker recesses on the other hand, which might otherwise have been too dark for display purposes, have been well lighted by building roof lights into the flat roof above. And by night, banks of spotlights, carefully arranged and fitted to the ceiling, are used to unobtrusively illuminate the paintings and sculpture and light up the rooms at the same time. Construction of the house was carried out using conventional methods and all finishes are simple. The brickwork was built using commons internally and semi-facings externally, the latter being laid stretcher bond for straight or slightly curved areas and in header bond for the more sharply curving corners. All exterior joints have been deeply raked, both horizontally and vertically, to emphasise the brick units and to give added texture and life to the walls while interior faces were rough cast plastered and painted white. Concrete floors have been laid throughout the house and have been finished with either red veneer bricks or edge-to-edge carpeting, all windows and doors are of steel and the roof is a flat one of hollow block construction. An interesting and unusual feature of the house is the use of wooden roller blinds placed as the outermost unit at each window or door opening. These retractable blinds are not only decorative but serve other purposes by cutting out heat reflection from the surrounding rock, by acting as burglar and hail proofing and as adjustable filters for light entering the house. A swimming pool has been built in a secluded part of the garden towards the rear of the house while a landscape architect has planned the surrounding garden which is a most interesting one because of the tangled combination of rock and earth. Planting consists mainly of aloes, succulents and cacti but lawns, shrubs and trees have also been used. To dramatise a large expanse of exposed rock immediately adjacent to the rear of the house a system of waterfalls, cascades and rock pools has been constructed which operates on a circulating water system and incorporates a child's paddling pond as one of the pools. Thus, while the interior of the house is highly suited to the requirements of the owners and is at the same time comfortable and most livable, a strong sense of naturalness has been achieved externally. The massive south elevation of the house, which has few openings, soars krans-like from the lower part of the stand and the northern elevation resembles in no uncertain manner a tangled fall of boulders. The garden is strewn with indigenous plant life where no exposed rock exists and where this does occur cascades and pools of water lend an air of tranquility akin to a mountain top immediately after a storm. The contractors were Van Streepen & Germs (Pty.) Ltd., of Johannesburg and the architect was Mr. Michael Sutton. [Journal of the South African Brick Association 1967 (No 1): sp.] Books that reference House Goodman
|
|
