Tembo Tembo Lodge: A Sustainable Oasis in Kruger’s Wilderness
Tembo Tembo, a remarkably innovative bush lodge designed by Paris based Studio Asaï, proposes a sustainable and sophisticated approach to the essence of living with the land.
Along the banks of the Sabie River lies a lodge so architecturally unique that it takes the harrumphing of elephants and scuttling warthog close-by to serve as a reminder that this is primal Kruger wilderness and nothing tamer.
Tembo Tembo is the holiday home of an American family, with four children and four grandchildren, who spends a lot of time in South Africa and has a true passion for safari and the veld. The home was designed by Antoine Simonin of Studio Asaï, a Paris-based architecture and design studio whose distinctive style has been featured in numerous issues of Architectural Digest.
About the brief, Antoine notes that ‘they wanted the least visible house ever, that was very safe but also fully integrated with its wild surroundings.’ This was his cue to look beyond the usual lodge vernacular of brick structures with 45-degree thatched roofs, which produces tall, visible buildings, and instead, he aimed to conceptualise a design that was ultimately, unusually, characterised by rammed earth walls and a flat roof.
The walls — exterior, interior, not simply feature walls — were inspired by the local termite mounds (which form natural dolmen architecture) and created from the earthworks of excavation. Structurally, they are layered like a mille-feuille, stacked on an iron structure and moulded by wooden planks. The flat roof was principally to reduce the visual footprint and also, as Antoine explains, an immersive feature. ‘It meant that if you wanted to see the river and animals you had to go outside and explore the land.’
The home speaks to an intimate understanding of the environment and its demands — and Antoine’s approach embraces both the spirit and resilience of the local ecosystem. ‘We have a responsibility when we build a house’, he comments. ‘The very first consideration here was to leave a minimal footprint in choosing earth for the building and foundations. This was in the instance that perhaps one day the house had to be demolished. The earth will go back to the earth.’
Antoine collaborated with Nicholas Plewman, a local architect with deep expertise and experience in lodge design, to bring the considered construction to life. The interior design aesthetic, another marker of Antoine’s novel twist on familiar codes, is resonant with a European panache for colour, materiality and a modernist mix of styles. Yet, Antoine was careful to avoid overtly decorative gestures. ‘Out of respect to the fauna and flora, we kept everything pared back, preferring to focus on the beauty of elemental materials,’ Antoine says of the interior architecture and finishes.
Dark floors, panels and columns are reminiscent of lightning-struck tree trunks, while the walls allude to the silvery taupe of campfire cinders from the night before. ‘The colours we used are all found in the landscape on site - a balance of bush greens, earthy terracotta and mineral reds and the blue of the sky’, Antoine recalls. What adds interest to this palette is the application: glossy powder coated metals, quirky marble and travertine, bed linens and terrazzo.
All materials, including stone, wood, fabrics, wallpapers, curtains, carpets, linens and basketry, were locally sourced, as was furniture from Lemon, Amatuli and Madwa. ‘As a suggestion of nomadic collector culture, some Italian, British and Swedish furniture was introduced to create a mix of periods and styles’, remarks Antoine. ‘But the intention was always to propose a feeling of lightness in the interior and let the safari spirit remain the unconditional golden thread.’
Text by Liz Morris
Photography by Adrien Dirand