House and Leisure - October 2015

T

wo years ago when DC and Celeste Bezuidenhout decided it

was time to update their Irene home they called on architect

Thomas Gouws, who had designed it for them 13 years prior.

At the time their son Gerard, now 15, was a toddler, and Celeste

was still pregnant with 14-year-old Anika.

‘This was my second project after I established my own practice,’

Thomas recalls. While the couple were looking for an architect

DC’s mother spotted a building in Mooikloof, Pretoria, and

suggested they look at it. ‘That house in Mooikloof was my first,’

says Thomas.

The Bezuidenhouts’ home is an early example of Thomas’

work but it has all the hallmarks of his approach: the

transparency, the simple, clean lines, the openness, the site-

sensitive design, the strong connection to the landscape and

the unadorned, neutral finishes that belie a rich combination

of textures and materials.

The rules of the estate specified farm style architecture so

Thomas built within the restrictions, developing steeply pitched

corrugated iron roofs and voluminous interior spaces – but

he worked in some modernist elements, too. ‘The idea was a

minimalist interpretation of a barn style house,’ says Thomas.

There were more important considerations than style, however.

He also needed to ensure the home worked in concert with its

environment. ‘A lot of the design was directed by the views and the

steep slope,’ he explains. The house overlooks a rocky ridge that

holds a now defunct quarry – which DC remembers swimming in

as a child – with natural highveld landscape between and beyond.

Thomas designed the house as much to draw in the landscape as to

facilitate an effortless indoor–outdoor lifestyle.

The entrance, which is essentially a glass box, barely disguises

its modernist character. ‘It’s designed to focus on the view as

you come in,’ says Thomas. Inside you immediately find yourself

looking out over a pool that draws your eye along its length, while

the uncertain water’s edge created by the rim flow blurs the

distinction between landscape and building. A curious inversion

has occurred: you’re inside but your eyes and mind are back outside.

Blurring boundaries in a different way, the stoep and pool deck

form near-seamless extensions of the indoor spaces. It’s barely

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