The site is a six acre piece of highveld. The owners and builders, Scott and Linda Brebnor. The house began as the simulation of the act of habitation on a piece of paper. A circle, beginning at the rocks, is marked out on the ground.  The contours, man's abstracted interpretation and dimensioning of the landscape, are terraced into the circle, and planted in two alternating strains of grass. The terraces are continuous and sweep up along the rim of the circle as roofs, weaving the ground into the sky, containing in its thickness the sheltered habitable part. The trusses open the roof to the air, whose hollowness supports the space, traps the clouds, pours off the rains. The circle of the buildings walling the oasis are, beginning at the rocks, the house, workshop and garage, the cottage, three huts loosely woven with the earth, the historic antecedent N'debelle plan, and the horselike stables.

Press

1997 - A House in the Transvaal - Princeton Architectural Press

Awards

2024 - Transvaal House Acquired by the University of Witswatersrand School of Architecture and Planning as a University Venue
1997 - Transvaal House Declared a National Monument by the Monuments Council in South Africa
1984 - Emerging Voices - The Architecture League