INNOVATIVE DEVELOPMENT WINNER
The Watershed, V&A Waterfront
What is now the Watershed at the V&A Waterfront
was historically an electrical warehouse and, in more
recent years, was divided up into the Blue Shed craft
market on the one side and the Maritime Museum on
the other. The V&A Waterfront was looking to increase
the footfall in a traditionally scarce a rea of the V&A and
increasing trading density for the market traders.
Architect, Heinrich Wolff, proposed not only using the
vacant space, but knocking through to the Blue Shed
and re-envisaging the space completely. The V&A
supported this idea and the Watershed was born.
The design concept stemmed from the intention to
create a sustainable urban condition that supports a
market economy. This is done by the creation of a street
through the workshop, thereby linking the aquarium to
the rest of the V&A Waterfront. This urban gesture offers
substantial benefit to the surrounding context, creating
opportunities for other urban role players to benefit from.
The buildings inside the shed address the pedestrian
street with a 50m x 50m columnless, suspended steel
structure flying over the street, releasing the potential
activities of the street.
The pedestrian street created through the Watershed
creates a vital urban connection between the main active
area around the shopping centre precinct and the
Clock Tower Precinct on the one side and the aquarium,
the bus stop, the GSB campus and new BRT stops on
the other.
Wolff Architects designed what has been dubbed the
‘floating floor’ – a suspended structure that makes a
50m x 50m gridded steel slab over the market. The
80
floating floor meant that the activity of the street below
could be complemented by another type of space, running
perpendicularly overhead. This substantially increases the
diversity and intensity of human interaction in the street.
The ground floor of the buiding is now home to some
150 small business owners selling a multitude of arts
and crafts, representing over 365 local brands.
Developer/Client: V & A Waterfront
Architects: Wolff Architects
Quantity Surveyors:
Pentad Quantity Surveyors
Structural Engineers: LH Consulting Engineers
Electrical Engineers: GIBB
Mechanical Engineers: Basil Nair & Associates
WSP Group Africa
Fire Consultants: SolutionStation
Acoustic Consultants:
Mackenzie Hoy Consulting Engineers
Environmental Consultants:
Greenbuild Consultants
Elevator Consultants:
Solutions for Elevating (S4E)
Wind Consultant: Adam Goliger
Landscape Architect: Julian Raxworthy
Land Surveyor: David Hellig & Abrahamse
Workshop 17 – Interior Architects:
Metropolis Design
Main Contractor:
WBHO Construction
Photography: Marc Hoberman
SAPOA Awards