INCLINATION

PERCHED HIGH ON WATERKLOOF RIDGE, THIS PRETORIA HOME TURNS THE CHALLENGE OF AN AWKWARD, WEDGE-SHAPED PLOT INTO THE INSPIRATION FOR ITS ARCHITECTURAL SOLUTION, WITH SHARP ANGLES, BEAUTIFUL NATURAL MATERIALS AND BREATHTAKING VIEWS.

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WITH ITS VIEWS OVER PRETORIA TREETOPS AND THE UNION BUILDINGS, it's not often that a pristine piece of land becomes available high up in Waterkloof Ridge.

The owners of this home were lucky to find just such a site freed by a subdivision. It was not without challenges: while the outlook was incredible, the plot was steep and wedge-shaped, with a narrow protrusion (which turned out to be perfect for a bonsai greenhouse).

The task of solving this architectural puzzle fell to Leon van der Westhuizen of Anthrop Abbott Architects.

His clients gave him a broad brief, with a few specific requests - a main bedroom and study with a view, as well as space for key artworks, including a Dylan Lewis sculpture and a large copper wall panel by Stanislaw Trzebinski. Beyond that, they granted Leon creative freedom.

"When you have a site like this, with such an unusual shape, how do you turn it to your advantage?" Leon asks. As a designer, he's already inclined to take a building that might otherwise be square on and turn it ever so slightly. "It makes things different," he explains. In this instance, that "difference" was baked into the site: a retaining wall near the street that didn't align perfectly with the boundary line, and on the other side of the house, the views to the north (which implied yet another line), offered plenty of sharp angles to work with.