kate otten architects

The golden thread of Johannesburg’s history started some two billion years ago when a massive meteorite crashed into the earth approximately one hundred kilometres south of the city. Gold deposits were buried in seams deep below the surface, coming to rest in an arc-shaped ridge. The discovery of gold in 1886, and the gold rush that followed, led to the establishment of Johannesburg.
Unlike a linear, patriarchal recording, this story is presented in The Laboratory of the Future as a simultaneous, intuitive reading of landscape narrated by women through craft and making.
Materials used are natural, decomposable, and specific to South Africa. The makers are women’s collectives, crafts, age-old traditions. The play of light and shadow, the use of colour and pattern, and the hand-making and collaborative process all represent our approach to architecture that is particular to a place and nurtures the human spirit.

Team
Salma Wadee, Lele Ramphele, The Herd Design, Frances van Hasselt, Katriena Kammies
With the additional support of
The Lucky Bean Trust