African project The Citadel – South Africa
marbles and warm metals on the public ground floor give way to an oaktreaded helical staircase up to a softer , warmer “ club ” environment upstairs . With predominantly wooden flooring , the first floor offers panoramic views of Table Mountain over the tree canopies . The area is intended to evoke a tree-house or club-house feeling , with a sense of belonging . A well-sized break-out area downstairs leads to a private entertainment courtyard and an impressive 140-seat raked auditorium . The interiors are , like the façade , distinctively modern in form but traditional in material and substance . Leathers , marbles and coppers are used , whilst seating is svelte and sophisticated .
The Citadel rises to nearly 30m in height and has been developed by Citadel Investment Services in a joint venture with national property development and asset management group , Atterbury , and landowners , Catalyst . The contractor was Stabilid Cape . Robert Silke & Partners is the Design Architect in association with Project Architects , LKA .
“ Digging down four basements into a high-rainfall environment was prohibitively expensive – but adequate parking was a non-negotiable ,” he says . “ The project was almost in jeopardy due to the excavation challenges – but we put our heads together with the structural engineers and effectively raised the basements out of the ground by 1.5m , which saved the budget and simultaneously enhanced the building ’ s civic presence with its raised plinth ,” concludes Silke .
Robert Silke & Partners is an award-winning firm of architects and interior designers specialising in the commercial , hospitality and residential sector . They are urbanists and believe in the concentration of dense , high-quality developments within established urban centres . Their core business is large-scale retail , hotels , offices and residential projects and blue-chip clients include The V & A Waterfront Company , Total SA , Atterbury , Buffet , Signatura , Beare Holdings , Tsogo Sun and , of course , Citadel . Based in Cape Town , they are presently at work in Johannesburg , Durban and as far afield as Kitwe , Zambia and Accra , Ghana .
The firm was established in 2015 as a partnership between Robert Silke and Robert McGiven , young architects who combine no less than 30 years collective
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