Architect and Builder Magazine South Africa March/April 2014 | Page 43

Retail Principles In doing so, it gave rise to the opportunity to express the building to a very active Uitenhage Road, resulting in good retail principles being applied, some of which are: that the entrances and parking must be visible from the main roads, the parking has a natural flow and service areas are hidden behind the building with separate access. The overall dynamic of the building is further scaled in relation to the existing surrounding industrial context with specific emphasis on the main entrances to the mall through large entrance porticos that, on one hand, mitigate the scale of the existing surrounding industrial buildings and, on the other, enhance the retail offering it provides. The distributions of different tenants, with an emphasis on food tenants at strategic positions such as the main entrance, further enhance the experience of a pedestrianised retail node. Kenako Mall Tenants Kenako Mall is anchored by Shoprite and other tenants include Hungry Lion, Shoprite Liquor, Pep, Mr Price, Truworths, Clicks, Jet, Identity, Legit, Edgars Active, Standard Bank, Fashion IQ, FNB, Cashbuild, Tekkie Town, OK Furniture’s, Morkels, Bears, Debonairs, Chesenyama, Cassies, Ellerines, the Post Office, McDonalds and many other smaller chains totalling a gross leasable area (GLA) of 20,000m2, a dedicated taxi area and 995 parking bays to satisfy the need for convenience shopping. Research done for the development indicated a catchment area of 340,000 customers and an estimated retail potential of R1.22 billion at the time it was done Design The massing on site with its future phase 2 will eventually achieve a mix of the required retail visibility and road edge definition. During the design stages, the shed-like building typology, with its very long walkway, created a loss of scale wherein it would have been difficult to identify with ones relevant location and one would only have known where one was if one 43