An interviewer recently asked me what I considered the pinnacle of my career, and the question stopped me cold. I never considered my career from the perspective of a graph with peaks and valleys, rather, I visualize it as a portfolio of experiences, relationships, projects, discoveries, travels and lessons. Looking back, The Palace of the Lost City in South Africa, completed in 1992, was a landmark commission for both me and my firm of talented design professionals.
Our client, Sol Kerzner of Sun International, a hotelier and gaming czar, gave us carte blanche to design and execute a hotel based on the myth of an ancient African kingdom that was eventually overgrown by the surrounding jungle. The site was outstanding, an African valley encircled by mountains and with a game reserve nearby. It was a remarkable design and logistics challenge that changed the trajectory of my firm and of my life personally.
Sun City sits in the crater of an extinct volcano. Almost 2 million cubic meters of earth was moved off the site before construction could begin in 1990.
The entire project was completed in just 28 months, a remarkably accelerated timeline for a project of this magnitude. I tip my hat to the entire team’s dedication and focus.
We had countless meetings because scale was a constant factor on this project. The proportions were so immense that it was imperative to mock-up virtually every space to insure the dimensions of furnishings, sculptures, art and lighting were correct. At the height of construction, 5,000 people worked on this project at one time. Wow!
The Palace project was a renaissance for countless tradespeople, craftsmen, artists and everything in between. I am so proud to say that 85% of all the interior requirements were sourced within South Africa.
Seen below is one of the more large-scale pieces we had created. A full scale clay model of Shawu. Shawu was one of 7 incredible elephant bulls that roamed Kruger National Park from 1926 to 1982. What a wonderful way to pay homage to this magnificent animal and to keep the importance of the conservation at the forefront of The Lost City experience.
At the culmination of many projects it is typical to have an end-of-construction party. The Palace party was one for the ages. Tributes, roasts, toasts, gifts and many high fives.
The Palace of The Lost City project represents a pivotal time in my life, and awakened in me a deep love of wildlife, a strong commitment to conservation, and a realigned engagement with philanthropy. I was so enamored with the African bush that I built a home – Izingwe Lodge (izingwelodge.com), established a foundation to fund medical research for pediatric AIDS, and built a proper school campus for the Waterberg Academy for the children in Vaalwater, Limpopo.
My African experience was the conduit for working with Oprah Winfrey on the design of her Leadership Academy in South Africa. As well, a series of serendipitous events lead to friendships with Nelson Mandela, F.W. de Klerk, Quincy Jones, Tina Turner and Desmond Tutu. I will dedicate a future blog to my incredible good fortune of counting many of my firm’s clients among my very best friends. But for now, I will close with this advice: When you see a door open to opportunity, I advise you to step through it! Doors can sometimes symbolize privacy and security, but they can also lead to a world beyond that which you could never imagine.
