RIVERSIDE GOVERNMENT COMPLEX

"Something needs to be said about the way in which the work of the other disciplines was woven into the texture of the building. Landscaping and art work are submerged into the fabric of the complex as is seldom seen in South Africa – seamlessly integrated rather than applied.” Bannie Brits, South African Architecture May/June 2002

In July 1994 the Mpumalanga Provincial Legislature decided to centralize all the legislative and executive functions of the provincial government in a single complex of buildings. The chosen site, an old citrus plantation, was edged by riverine forest sloping steeply to the Nels and Crocodile Rivers, which afforded beautiful views across the valleys. 

NLA jointly won a design competition with KWP Landscape Architects and in 1999 were appointed to do the work.  Given the sensitive approach employed by the architects, and referring to the natural and cultural environment for contextual and narrative clues, the challenge was to create a new landscape that merged with and enhanced the fabric of the buildings but also in places, expressed itself for its own sake.  The overall aim was to create a setting that did not appear as an autonomous ‘add on’ but rather integrates the buildings, the designed landscape and the natural environment in a seamless manner.  This is evident in the plaza area where a minimalist philosophy was applied.  A lone kgotla tree, placed against a backdrop of orange columns, was juxtaposed and balanced with a water feature and a series of Coral trees at the edge of the plaza to complete the composition.  In total 790 trees, 6,000 shrubs and 51,000 ground covers were planted and 185 different indigenous plant species were used in the planting ‘palette’.