Africa creative renaissance - wildetecture ideal

It is a fact that Africa is an extremely dramatic continent.  It has always striven to be independent of western ideals, many men and cultures have tried to mold Africa into an extension of Europe. However it has always fervently sought its own unique identity. An identity as old as the sculpted cape fold mountains. From the Sphinx, Pyramids to the Moors, Hausa, Dogon and Ndebele - African architecture has always been extremely dramatic, gaudy , wild.
It is this wildness that the style of wildetecture tries to in a small way emulate. Its the untamed aspects of Africa design that will help mold and create wildetectures  expressionistic interpretation of architecture on this untamed continent. 

Using these very Africa design points of departure, Wildetecture proposes a few examples for an Africa architectural renaissance. Definitely not to every ones taste, A bold  way of conceptualizing and interpreting the untamed continents unique architecture , art and design style.

Suggestions to improve Fish Hoek

Fish Hoek is a small coastal town on the Cape

Peninsula. I have a vested interest in this little valley as i was born in Falsebay hospital and grew up between the confines of the Kalk Bay mountains and Elsies peak. I write grew up with reservation.

I have for many years been suggesting improvements to this little place and its industrialised main road. I have created several little booklets and plan layouts which Ive handed to community papers, community magazines , estate agents and business property owners on the main road. Unfortunately my perspectives of improving the Fish Hoek main road has not really amounted to much.

So if folk cant see a value in your suggestions - blog about it. Maybe someone out there has a similar little town they are emotionally attached to and can use the suggestions.

Fish Hoek has an A-list blue status beach which is separated from the heart of the town by a railway line. Which means the 2 operate independently from each other. Another interesting development is that the beach accommodates cars more than it accommodates people. Many years ago the municipality created paid for parking on the beach which is a little money spinner for someone. So on a sweltering hot summers day cars clog up the bulk of the beach area - Whilst the people squash themselves in a small sliver of sand and grass. Ive always marvelled at this. The effect is exaggerated when a great white shark makes an appearance and everyone leaves the water. Now the little sliver of pedestrian area is completely crowded. High tide is also an interesting happening.

The railway line is not an attractive addition to this scenario and really spoils what could be an awesome beach town atmosphere.

Here are my suggestions - and like most suggestions they are not easy to institute, they will take planning and hard work. They will be very expensive.  But the rewards for all will be worth the effort im sure.

Firstly spoornet needs to relook at the railway line - why?- Because it is my understanding that they sold off spoornet land on the clovelly side of Fish Hoek main road. The flats that where built on this stretch did nothing to improve the atmosphere of Fish Hoek. Infact between the face brick prison of a police station and the face brick spoornet flats - We have an uninviting bricklane entrance to the village. So my suggestion to spoornet is this. -

The railway line can either be raised as in kalkbay or buried in a tunnel underground. just for the 200m from the railway station to the restaurant at the beach. Alternatively the train between simonstown and fish hoek could run seperately with a station at sunnycove. A taxi service can link these 2 stations. I know the engineering on some of these suggestions will be both costly and difficult but it will allow the town to filter onto the beach.

The cars which now enjoy the bulk of the A-list beach can be housed in a 3 storey parking garage built on the parking ground in 1st avenue. This will allow folk to park their cars and filter through the village shops on the way to the beach. Like the Algarve in Portugal - a perfect example of sound design.

There are certain big corporates that own shops leading into Fish Hoek. These buildings turn their back on the main road and can be altered to reflect a more inviting facade as you enter the village.

A walkway can be added over the pavement on both sides of the fish hoek main road - This will create 2 levels of shop frontage as you would find in a mall - only this will be an open air shopping experience.

The garden of remembrance can couple as a sculpture garden and the circle at the end of fish hoek could have a coffee shop with walkways leading to it under the road.

Kalkbay and Simonstown have such wonderful atmosphere and most folk when riding through fish hoek have no reason to stop. Although huge improvements have been made since i first started making these suggestions, i do feel the railway link , parking and certain buildings need architectural improvement before fish hoek reaches its full village potential.

The above 2 presentation jpgs are an extreme form of getting attention. I read an article that fish hoek and muizenberg beach where zoned for 10 and 12 storey blocks of flats. So i decided to design a possible Franken freakish wildetecture  scenario. The design keys into a revival of Gothic ideas with humanoid structure being sculpturely displayed on the outside of the buildings. Definitely only to a few peoples taste and definitely bound to create the needed controversy for change.

I really do love these coralscape sort of lines - However i have found that conservative towns will go to great lengths to preserve their boxes and conservative ideals. I now live in Muizenberg - For reasons best kept to myself this has been a great move.

Recycled creative drawing board work station

Creativite design, artistic endeavor is more about developing a super tough critic proof skin and hard calloused knuckles for door knocking your work and ideas. The title of being creative is best given from those around you and shouldn't really emanate from your own mouth to often. - This is a code to live by. Human driven creativity should to my mind be first and foremost humble. A contradiction i hear from the single person reading this blog. 

I have been chasing pavements, sketching and tinkling computer keys with my wildetecture Africa fauvistic architectural design concepts for many years. As well as the Erxell concept idea for awhile now. For the 1 blogger reader you will be unfamiliar with these design ideas - I have in part summarised the Erxell concept below and on other blogs. - wildetecture has its own website. Www.wildetecture.com The road to being artistically heard and seen is aligned with the creatively blind and deaf. Im sorry to burst a bubble, my 1 blogger reader.

The Erxell concept.

The Erxell concept is an exciting new design venture which I find myself hurtling towards at the speed of light. It keys in part into the now recycled creative drawing board and the idea of creating jobs and better systems for an Africa setting informal settlement. I have had a passion for some time to create communicative links between industry, artists, creatives, designers, education and informal settlements. The recycled drawing board was the first phase of this vision, the optimistic catalyst or creative spark item (CSI) to create a tangible vehicle for this elusive communicative link. Crossing language barriers, socio divides and communicating through raw artistic graphics. In part the design idea is termed the Erxell concept. Which provides a mechanism to reach into impoverished areas and empower those through simple, clever design. Being sympathetic to the many cultural, financial and social issues within these communities and others.

Simply put QJD dsigen sutdio (i know) wants to consult to industry, informal settlements, educational partners - By using industries waste, Create well designed usable creative tool products, which folk in informal settlements can help manufacture. Creating a type of synergy, a glass bead of creative trade between all socio economic groups and try put them around the industry table.

The recycled creative drawing board will be this symbol or sculpture of this design endeavour - Reaching into the most impoverished communities and providing a vehicle for artistic graphic communication. Old school sketching style. Ol one reader blogger says AI will provide this service? I vehemently disagree 1 reader blogger. The human mind is far superior. So while harvester idea machines work at switching our crestive artistic minds off. I champion the idea of switching our human creative minds on. 

As is so true - an artistically compiled picture speaks a thousand words. When compiled by human hands it further envokes emotion, synergy and incredible potentail.

Now ladies and gentlemen and the one blogger reader.  That's an idea to get completely excited about. 

The set of pictures above show step 1-4 of being able to pack and transport these design artistic drawing boards anywhere in the world.

The unveiling of the draughting chair . A fitting symbol of welding graphics, art, sculpture and design ideas. This keys into the concept of the revolutionary PGM and Vivaladraught ideas currently being explored.

Human driven creativity is the long road to skilled outcome process thinking and to beautiful emotive art work. 

New premises for QJD dsigen sutdio

When moving into new premises one is conscious of something in the air, a sense of expectancy that seems to emanate from deep within. An optimism that only a new environment can bring.

For the last 10 years i have run my studio from an office within my living space. This has served me very well and i have been able to look after family and work responsibilities simultaneously.

However the need to separate work from the family and the creative art component is a very necessary step. I have been offered a rare privilege to run my design studio from the academy of inventive design and technology campus. I have been teaching draughting and CAD design since 1994 and i have always contracted my services to the various colleges and training institutes that i have aligned myself with. This is the first step to weld aspects of my studio with a training component. The new premises form part of the Lesedi nuclear training facility in century city, Edison drive.

This sense of expectancy in the air for QJD dsigen sutdio is palpable - I have access to many draughting hands and feet, the surroundings of state of the art facilities, a corner office Mr Trump and a growing team of creative professionals. I have visions of extending the design consultancy aspect of my studio and a few other secret squirrel ideas.

The new office furniture i have designed is being manufactured - Its a modest piece of deco - a shelf - which embodies all my ideals and will be a comfortable transition piece - From home to office. so if your in the area mr jack tv, wimbat wimble, jack smith - pop in for a visit.

I absolutely believe even in these financially tumultuous times, sincere creative endeavour will always prevail.

QJD dsigen sutdio - exhibition stand

My goal - is to build the QJD dsigen sutdio exhibition stand and have it ready for the Muizenberg kite festival. The QJD stand will have examples of all the studios work - as off the wall as it is. QJD t-shirts , furniture , sculpture - rare Nado Storm original artwork and comics, the yip trip childrens series will also be available amongst a host of other QJD dsigen sutdio bits and bobs. the furniture will be ordered from the originals and will be in a series of 10 to 20 only.

Muizenberg here in Cape Town is an awsome place to live and create. The people, the atmosphere and the beach are wonderfully inspirational.

(Because on a blog post you can interject from the future. Thats what im doing now. Interjecting from 2026. Its wonderful to read ones nieve but sincere ideas many moons back above. This idea never materialised. As some markets are craft markets, some are for artists and some are food, clothes and everything else. Muizenberg should try host an art market fair. Would be interesting to see how that goes. Real people infront of their work. None of this behind computer screen easy marketing gumph. I mean an actual conversation with a real artistic person art fair)

Informal settlement creative work station.

To create a space saving multi functional design creative work station in an informal settlement dwelling is a huge challenge. 

South Africa has huge informal settlements that are home to millions of people. The title informal settlement is not at all accurate really. These communities try exist under very challenging conditions. No point going into the socio and political narrative right now. That is an entirely different discussion. A very important one. 

Whats important to understand is that millions of people currently live in a built environment setting that is way below any living standards. The solutions are complicated and will require immense input from many entities. Im just looking at a small ideas generating design creative angle. The challenges in these communities is so hugely vast, this little design idea is embarrassingly to little. However at the moment from my understanding is we dont even have embarrassingly to little solutions. We appear to have absolutely none. People are suffering, the built environment is not coping. That's the fact of the matter. 

My inspiration for this idea was originally to create a communicative link/ vehicle between people living in an informal settlement, creative designers and industry. As a design concept picture speaks a thousand words, i felt that ideas would flow more easily between the various groups. If a creative workstation was designed. A design creative right now, right here vehicle concept which will try teach creative conceptual designers such as myself how to improve conditions for those living under such extremely deplorable conditions. Spark the poets and the dreamers to design workable solutions for the future. At present nobody is being sparked, so until one can spark the rest. A good place to start for me is the creatives. You are welcome to spark those minds and skills you identify with. 

My other more cumbersome creative work stations would take up to much space in an already crowded informal settlement home. These drawing type stations could be put into community halls and schools. This improved design creates a drawing board, table, bench , shelves and computer station all keyed into the structure of the dwelling. - So the workstation actually strengthens the architecture of the informal settlement dwelling. These informal settlements used to be termed shantys or shacks. Which is a more realistic term as informal settlement almost makes the architecture sound livable. Its absolutely not. Its tin built on top of the sand. No damp proofing , no living standards, its very sad that people are left to live like this. When huge amounts of money is being pilfered by the very people put in charge to oversee the people.

The bright colours of the work station hopefully will try enhance mood and hopefully ignite the creative spark of our future informal settlement engineers, artists, draughtspersons and wild designers.

Creating design spaces for future visionarys. Those undergoing real challenges now are better equipped to try learn to design and create future solutions. Lets give them the tools and space to try creativly solve living conditions and for minds to look for solutions. Who better to improve conditions than those who understand living directly within the challenges. We could create collaborative sessions to try improve collectively peoples lives across the socio economic divides. Just trying to create a spark really. At present there is nothing. 

An embarrassingly small idea can at least start a revolution of future thought. This creative station is my idea, Whats yours?

Khayalitsha agricultural project wildetecture style

The erxell concept is a futuristic conceptual design idea coupled with Wildetecture design ideals - As per all design concepts, one has to fully understand that its way beyond the concept of MAYA - (Most Advanced Yet Acceptable) ie for the time now its to mal, to contemplate.

However wildetecture will continue to advocate the Erxell concept even if current design mindsets have written it off - Principally because  it benefits destitute folk who really need a better system to key into. Until these informal settlement folk can sit at the negotiating table with a product to sell - Big business, government, society will be content to keep feeding the destitute charitable limited crumbs.

Cape Town has huge informal settlement communities living under current extremely desperate conditions - In fire tinder box tin shacks just outside or in all the major cities - These dwellings roof space - could become a blank canvas that will benefit a few thousand informal settlement dwellers. An agricultural crop circle billboard put onto 100 x 100 informal settlement shack roofs. The families benefit from waterproofed roof and possible residual income - Advertising gets the biggest dargone sign in the world - win win -  Yes the challenges for instituting this concept are immense , yes to get the folk living in these settlements to continually upgrade and manicure their signage will be challenging. It is these challenges the advertising machine and government need to look at addressing - Because it will add a new dimension onto  the actual earth branded signage - The erxell was developed for the express purpose of putting the poor and advertising at the same table. Perhaps facilitated by government. What government lets their people live under deplorable informal settlements? Without creating urban developement solutions not controlled by gangs and corrupt landlords.  Now thats an idea -  www.erxell.com  - Thats a billboard to get excited about.

QJD design studio has long been busy promoting the Erxell concept  - Its a layering urban developement concept - let me explain. The actual branding component is only a part of the overall idea. as south africans we design our urban sprawl for the destitute very 1 dimensionally - Outwards and as fast as possible. What if we could literally live under our own.plsnted vineyards? Yes that would require platforms - using a lightweight frame  structure which the human living component keys into. So the structure for the platform and abode are 1 - taking care of 2 living dynamics at once.

The platform will allow the growth of lightweight produce like veggies, vineyards and possibly wheat. So the cultivating fields are above the dwelling component. Which forms the layering idea - The branding component forms a futuristic crop circle with the growing component cleverly interwoven into the visual branded design logo. Much like the Victorian manicured gardens of old and crop circles combined. The value of the Erxell unit of measure which is what the advertising giants buy from the informal settlement dweller will increase with the better kept logos. Which creates work, food and incentive to both cultivate and keep the cape flats looking green, green , green.

So the logo is an organic sculpture which needs maintenance - Every plane flying over the cape flats area will be able to see if the workers below are manicuring their crops and fields - This will increase the rent able Erxell space and ultimately be the monetary value - other than the actual food of course which can be bartered as in times of old.

My steps so far -

I have approached the South African institute of draughting. They have endorsed my new unit of earth brand able measurement - They have seen the future prospects of this form of large scale draughting. - The Erxell - 3 cubits X 3 cubits -( Erxell is earth sell and pixel combined) - Thereby creating A glass bead of trade between the advertising giants and your little family living in a current informal settlement shack at eg. 1 khayalitsha site B. This creates a system whereby we all benefit. A cultivated garden pointing skywards - Creating a brandable billboard - everyone wins.

Because this idea goes way beyond Raymond Loewy's MAYA concept - (Most Advanced Yet Acceptable). Its been a very slow education process. I am getting abit of airtime in design mags, its received recognition from Holcim and a few other international accolades. - I believe the way forward is one shack at a time.

I believe altruistically if a system is designed in place to have a holistic affect on an entire community - The current riff raff will not dare disrupt the balance - These communities are held ransom by criminals. No government intervention. They have to survive on their own. Nobody comes to their rescue. That is a fact.  

If the multitudes are aware that collectively they can draw attention to their plight and gain finance in this way - They will police their own area and make sure the criminal element doesn't rock the current .

www.wildetecture.com 

Busy with other future city scape urban visionary design ideas. However im aware these conceptual design ideas are not possible currently. The very sad reality of south africas rural community has been poured into its big cities. Sadly people live in deplorable informal settlements with not much hope for the future. Thats a Fact. A bit of design idea respite can be to weld the rural with the city scape. 

http://www.erxell.com/ founder member of the erxell effect. One positive move forward.