In the heart of the city’s cultural and historic core, Spindle is the fabulous new skyscraper where just thirteen owners will get to live in splendid isolation. Lin Sampson conjures Rapunzel in her ivory tower...
Spindle, as tall and bendy as a blade, is the elegant new tower on the south side of Church Square, at the confluence of Plein and Spin Streets. Designed by the aptly named Robert Silke & Partners, it was here in the nineteenth century that silk spinning businesses sprang up.
Spindle is sixteen storeys tall and is remarkably slender. Ground floor is the entrance but the stand-out feature is valet parking by a uniformed doorman. First to fifth are full-floor office chambers for professionals. Sixth to eleventh are full-floor mansion apartments. Twelfth to fifteenth are penthouse duplexes. There is no thirteenth floor.
The tower has a fairy-tale quality: Rapunzel, Rapunzel let down your hair. It is both edgy and sexy.
Rapunzel lived alone in a tower, where she was held captive by her grandmother, who came up by climbing her long, beautiful hair. The girl ultimately did prefer to live alone in the tower, as life would be tranquil, peaceful, and rare.
"People can at once feel both excited and uncomfortable in a tower," says Silke, "A cottage can be pretty, but a tower is beautiful. This is because a tower can also be dangerous. It is only modern technology that allows it to stand at all." Of course the views are eye-shattering, the building seems to push away the sky. A tower brings all your senses into play.
Receive a tax ‘refund’ of up to 38% of your purchase price.
Inasmuch as Fran Lebowitz would come to mythologise New York in her Netflix series, "Pretend It’s a City", Lin Sampson "hangs" in Cape Town's historic and cultural core, playing witness to its ongoing rise and rise...
Let me confess: I am a sucker for cities.
Great cities are disappearing with their compacted layers of history, the scattershot of life, the grit and intertwingle of survival.
Cities have a raw immediacy, full of fractures, ambiguities, contradictions and eccentricities. It is in a city that you can glimpse the salt mines of grief, depression, narcissistic injury, alienation and pure joy.
At Fyn, South Africa’s wild freedom is tempered by the rigours of contemporary cuisine to create a restaurant at the edge.
The best place in Cape Town to slurp silky freshly made noodles and socialise with brimful glasses of sake.
Climb mountains, picnic in forests, share a beach with penguins, hike amidst fynbos and ascend to a lighthouse in a Flying Dutchman.
Founded in 1825, the museum houses important African zoology, palaeontology and archaeology collections.
Located in the vibrant city centre of Cape Town, surrounded by the cobbled historical area of Church Square.
Experience exceptional alchemy of fine dining fused with traditional Indian design.
Founded in 1914, the orchestra is arguably the most versatile and active orchestra on the continent of Africa.
Our iconic pink lady, which has been captivating visitors since 1899, is the beating heart of Cape Town.
.webp)
.webp)
.webp)
.webp)
.webp)
.webp)
