CAST-STONE CLADDING ADDS A CLASSICAL TOUCH

Caption: Revelstone’s cast-stone Ridgestone cladding has transformed the SACS Old Boys Union building into a structure more in keeping with the school’s classical architecture.

Written by David Beer on behalf of the Concrete Manufacturers Association

In 2022, The Brodie Room, a building which overlooks the two Memorial rugby fields at Cape Town’s SACS high school underwent a major face lift. What had been an ordinary red face-brick structure built in the mid-1980s with a red-tiled roof, was transformed into a building which mirrors the street-facing facades of two of the school’s administration buildings.

These are graceful structures situated at right angles to The Brodie Room. Embellished with classical Greco-Roman- styled columns and porticos, their walls are clad in sandstone at ground level and plastered above.

The Brodie Room is home to the SACS Old Boys Union and when the make-over was under consideration it was felt that that the building should mirror the sandstone and plastered facades of the administration buildings.

The material chosen to match the sandstone was Ridgestone cast-stone cladding manufactured exclusively  by Concrete Manufacturers Association (CMA) member, Revelstone.  Applied in three colours, Ridgestone is not only indistinguishable from natural stone but is also more affordable. As with the two administration buildings, the lower half of The Brodie Room wall was clad in Ridgestone and the upper section plastered. And a Roman-styled arch, which frames a double-door at ground-level of the building, was also clad with Ridgestone.

The back of the building, which fronts onto a swimming pool, was plastered, and, in keeping with the administration buildings, the roof was painted grey.

The site on which the Brodie Room stands is exceptional in that it is the only portion of the school grounds which is not owned by the government, but rather by the Old Boys Union. This was the result of a swap that occurred when the school relocated from the city to Newlands in 1960. The Old Boys Union owned the land on which the Memorial Fields now stand and they agreed exchange them for the site where The Brodie Room was subsequently built.

Old boys and parents donated generously to the building fund. However, the building was named after Bernard Brodie who attended the school from 1927 to 1936, and who was the major contributor to its construction.

Founded in 1829, SACS is arguably South Africa’s oldest school. And many old boys are illustrious public figures such as, to name a few: Dr Abdullah Abduraham; Jan Hofmeyer; Peter Kirsten; Percy Montgomery; Dr Cecil Moss; and Albie Sachs.