The Architecture of Peter Rich

Peter Rich is one of the most prolific architects practicing in South Africa today. His brick, vaulted mapungubwe interpretation center of 2009 confirmed his reputation as a contemporary architect of exceptional versatility and skill. Influenced since his student days at Witwatersrand by the exiled Mozambique architect Pancho Gueddes, Rich’s wide-ranging approach is also subtly indebted to the architectonic culture of the Ndebele; and indigenous African Civilization destroyed by the Boers at the end of the 19th century. At the same time his uniquely additive cellular manner owes more to the Raumplan of Adolf Loos than to the plan Libre of Le Corbusier.

Kenneth Frampton

We have had the unique pleasure and pain of traveling with Peter and Diane in Ethiopia. I say pleasure because he is a great story teller and deeply knowledgeable. I say pain because he has an indefatigable and exhausting curiosity which expressed itself by inviting himself (and us) into every dwelling we walked past so that he could draw the plans and do perspectives. Although we were always received graciously, I am sure our presence puzzled many.

You see these drawings throughout this book - he is an architect who understands the world through what he learns from his eyes and his hands.

And in doing so, he has created a body of work that is not vernacular but is deeply rooted in the place that is his home. It is absolutely clear that Peter Rich brings his heart to every project that he does.

Billie Tsien of Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects

Jonathan Noble is Professor of Architecture at the University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa. He is author of African Identity in Post-Apartheid Public Architecture: White Skin, Black Masks, 2011, Ashgate.