Every stone in these walls was quarried inside the province and packed by hand, because stone that has stood in this sun its whole life gives the heat back slowly, long after dark. The timber overhead was cut nearby for the same reason. Nothing was chosen because it photographs well. It was chosen for what it does to the air around you while you sleep.
The land was left as we found it. The buildings step down the granite ridge instead of cutting into it, the game paths were walked and mapped before a single line was drawn, and no tree came down that did not have to. The herds still move through the gap below the villas at first light, exactly as they did when there was nothing here to move past.
Drawn by Louis Liebenberg Architects, a practice working since 1992 from Pretoria and Hartbeespoort, forty minutes from this gate.