The Influencers' Influences LUYANDA MPAHLWA

Ever wondered who our current generation of architects looks up to? For the director of DESIGN SPACE AFRICA, the socially centred designs of RENZO PIANO, DIÉBÉDO FRANCIS KÉRÉ and CHARLES CORREA continue to inspire.

- ANNETTE KLINGER

AS A YOUNG BOY GROWING UP IN THE 1960s in the former homeland of the Transkei, Luyanda Mpahlwa loved drawing houses. It was something he’d completely forgotten about by the time he’d reached his matric year in 1976, when it was time to make the critical decision about what he wanted to do with his life. “My father was an English and Latin teacher, and wanted his three sons and daughter to study engineering, because that’s where he thought the future of the country lay,” says Luyanda. “But my mother, a nurse, remembered that I used to love drawing houses, so she managed to get me an internship at what was, at the time, the only white architectural firm in Umtata, Osmond Lange. In the same year, the Transkei received its so-called independence, and the Soweto uprisings were happening. My politicisation started then.”