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Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time
Fragments of apartheid spatial planning still linger in our South African cities. These modernist separationist elements take form as highways or green buffer zones. At neighbourhood scales, these elements create separation and spatial injustice from the lack of access to resources and amenities. Th...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
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Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment
2023
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| _version_ | 1867613893867601920 |
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| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Govender, Adeeshtra |
| author2 | Michael Louw |
| author_browse | Govender, Adeeshtra Michael Louw |
| author_facet | Michael Louw Govender, Adeeshtra |
| author_sort | Govender, Adeeshtra |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | Fragments of apartheid spatial planning still linger in our South African cities. These modernist separationist elements take form as highways or green buffer zones. At neighbourhood scales, these elements create separation and spatial injustice from the lack of access to resources and amenities. The open green space between Imizamo Yethu and the Helgrada Kronenzicht Estate sub-districts are a clear indication of these elements in Hout Bay, South Africa. Strife and urban sprawl permeate Imizamo Yethu and there is a desire for nearby civic amenities. To soothe the spatial injustice, I propose to transform this green buffer zone into a public civic space with a cultural community centre that will benefit Hout Bay through gathering, better spatial connection, and cultural substance. The current climate crisis acted as a primary design driver into the study of timber practice in South Africa for the architectural response. However, it is not common construction practice despite us having a timber practice heritage. An analysis of South African timber practice was undertaken in this dissertation to unpack architectural links to reconnect us to our timber heritage. A reinterpretation of past timber practice acted as an informant for the design's construction logic. It evokes links of our memories of craft and shared cultural heritage. From this, I derived an architectural material attitude of permeation, honesty and connection and brought principles of the roof and tectonic as design drivers for my project. Prototyping and digital modelling helped in reinterpreting the past through contemporary innovations of digital structural analysis, steam bending, and lamination. This informed the tectonic language of the architecture through the links of time, culture, technology, and space. The project connects communities and cultural construction systems through time and space via the design of a cultural community centre in Hout Bay. It does this by reconnecting us to our past timber heritage by reinterpreting the ontological readings of historical timber systems for a better climate future. The design employs reinterpreted timber tectonic and tests the possibility of permeability and connection against the common practice of exclusionary, hard edged civic forms that causes spatial injustice. The result is an architectural design that gathers people under one roof to create art, learn, connect in a weave of space, time, and culture. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/37997 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:43:23.544Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2023 |
| publishDateRange | 2023 |
| publishDateSort | 2023 |
| publisher | Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment |
| publisherStr | Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/37997 Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time Govender, Adeeshtra Michael Louw Architecture Fragments of apartheid spatial planning still linger in our South African cities. These modernist separationist elements take form as highways or green buffer zones. At neighbourhood scales, these elements create separation and spatial injustice from the lack of access to resources and amenities. The open green space between Imizamo Yethu and the Helgrada Kronenzicht Estate sub-districts are a clear indication of these elements in Hout Bay, South Africa. Strife and urban sprawl permeate Imizamo Yethu and there is a desire for nearby civic amenities. To soothe the spatial injustice, I propose to transform this green buffer zone into a public civic space with a cultural community centre that will benefit Hout Bay through gathering, better spatial connection, and cultural substance. The current climate crisis acted as a primary design driver into the study of timber practice in South Africa for the architectural response. However, it is not common construction practice despite us having a timber practice heritage. An analysis of South African timber practice was undertaken in this dissertation to unpack architectural links to reconnect us to our timber heritage. A reinterpretation of past timber practice acted as an informant for the design's construction logic. It evokes links of our memories of craft and shared cultural heritage. From this, I derived an architectural material attitude of permeation, honesty and connection and brought principles of the roof and tectonic as design drivers for my project. Prototyping and digital modelling helped in reinterpreting the past through contemporary innovations of digital structural analysis, steam bending, and lamination. This informed the tectonic language of the architecture through the links of time, culture, technology, and space. The project connects communities and cultural construction systems through time and space via the design of a cultural community centre in Hout Bay. It does this by reconnecting us to our past timber heritage by reinterpreting the ontological readings of historical timber systems for a better climate future. The design employs reinterpreted timber tectonic and tests the possibility of permeability and connection against the common practice of exclusionary, hard edged civic forms that causes spatial injustice. The result is an architectural design that gathers people under one roof to create art, learn, connect in a weave of space, time, and culture. 2023-06-29T07:15:48Z 2023-06-29T07:15:48Z 2023 2023-06-29T07:14:03Z Thesis / Dissertation http://hdl.handle.net/11427/37997 eng application/pdf Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment |
| spellingShingle | Architecture Govender, Adeeshtra Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time |
| title | Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time |
| title_full | Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time |
| title_fullStr | Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time |
| title_full_unstemmed | Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time |
| title_short | Connective Tectonics: The Kunye Cultural Community Centre - Weaving people, space, and time |
| title_sort | connective tectonics the kunye cultural community centre weaving people space and time |
| topic | Architecture |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/37997 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT govenderadeeshtra connectivetectonicsthekunyeculturalcommunitycentreweavingpeoplespaceandtime |