Shopping Center awards show innovation in SA

SA’s status in the rapidly evolving shopping mall design and development environment has been further underlined by a new set of property awards this month.

Middelburg Mall, Sandton City, Kagiso Mall, Tribeca Standard Restaurant at Lynnwood Bridge, and Hackett London at Sandton City all won top honours at the annual South African shopping centre industry awards.

Winners of the Retail Design and Development Awards, a South African Council of Shopping Centres initiative, were announced at the council’s annual congress in Durban.

The awards recognise exceptional shopping centre design and economic success in the South African property industry .

The GM of the shopping centres council, Amanda Stops, says the competitive display of entries received this year is an excellent indicator of retail sector innovation and business strategy in SA.

A panel of retail and property professionals selected from the best developments in South African retail property looked at design resolution, overall development objective, response to environment and market, innovative solutions and sustainability.

Praised for its design and function, Middelburg Mall in Mpumalanga won the award for a centre larger than 20,000 square metres, to the credit of architects MDS Architecture and developers Flanagan & Gerard and the Moolman Group.

In this category, judges also commended Greater Edendale Mall in KwaZulu-Natal, developed by McCormick Property Development with architects MDS Architecture.

Success in the category for new centres smaller than 20,000 square metres went to the redeveloped Kagiso Mall, developed by Old Mutual Property and designed by KMH Architects.

Taking the award in the retail centre expansion or renovation category was Sandton City’s Repositioning Phase 1. Developers Liberty Group and Pareto, with MDS Architecture and MMA Architects, were prominent players in this ambitious project.

For the design of a shop or restaurant in a shopping centre, the judges selected two winning designs: Tribeca Standard Restaurant at Lynnwood Bridge, designed by Braam de Villiers, and Hackett London at Sandton City, designed by Michael Carey.

The awards were sponsored by Nedbank Corporate Property Finance.