ARCHITECTS
THE MEDIAN OF ROSEBANK
M essaris Wapenaar Cole Architects was commissioned at the end of 2014 to design what was originally intended to be a 14-floor apartment building. With its prime position in the heart of the busy hub of Rosebank, The Median was envisaged by the client as a building which was to become the icon of nouveau apartment living in Rosebank. The site for the new building was the corner of Tyrwhitt and Craddock Avenue, the gateway to the pedestrianised upper Tyrwhitt Avenue where it intersects the north/south pedestrian artery from the Mall of Rosebank to the taxi rank at Jellicoe Avenue, and is walking distance from the Gautrain and all of Rosebank’s amenities. As with most urban sites, the median site is compact and consequently the footprint of the building is small. Access and egress for both vehicles and pedestrians would be on Tyrwhitt Avenue, occupying most of the façade at street level, with the exception of a small retail offering addressing the building’s contribution to the Rosebank retail precinct. What was clear from the start, was that if the building were to become any sort of icon at all, it would need to be a type of urban scale sculpture, boasting an urban scale iconography whilst addressing the human scale of the largely pedestrianised mall of upper Tyrwhitt Avenue that it would become part of. The urban scale iconography of the building speaks to the public spaces around it, in terms of the interface the building has with the street, as well as the interface between the street and the pavement- scape itself. Above the street, the private apartment part of the building surrounds a 15-floor covered atrium. The apartments face outward, with views directed diagonally from the building to secure a feeling of space in what will ultimately become a totally high-rise environment. The initial design concept was derived from what other designers, charged with similar briefs, had done before internationally. Thereafter, historical precedent became the informative backbone of the design. The skeletal curve of the balcony arrangement was adopted early in the design process together with the full height atrium window over the entrance in Tyrwhitt Avenue to create the buildings urban scale appearance. The Median’s 140 apartments were then integrated into the, hopefully iconic, skeleton of the Tyrwhitt/ Craddock corner in a midnight blue rectangular structure characterised by modernist L-shaped exposed elements and four reflective screens. In considering the environmental impact, a decision was made to create setbacks between the building and the boundaries, as well as the curvature which was introduced to minimise the shadow cast by the building as well as the colour choices which cause the building to blend with its urban environment. Internally, the entrance, although small for a
88 21 st Best Project Awards 2022
Made with FlippingBook flipbook maker