Description

Three Residential Units for Medium Income Families in a crime riddled dormitory suburb in Johannesburg.

Designed like the constitution of a beetle: hard on the outside and soft on the inside. Hence the name...

The project was devised to fill an empty plot of land belonging to an apartment building where vagrants and criminals had set up residence and garbage was piling up.

The caretaker of the building had barricaded himself behind barbed wire and by 6pm none of the residents dared go outside.

The owner allowed the construction of the building to be undertaken as a community social upliftment project by hiring only unskilled people from the neighbourhood and teaching them building skills whilst earning industry standard wages.

Designed

2005

Completed

2007