PARIS — Thebe Magugu is branching out into inns.
Following the opening final 12 months of Magugu Home, his retail and tradition hub in Johannesburg, the South African designer is touchdown in Cape City with a signature suite on the historic Mount Nelson, a part of the Belmond group owned by luxurious conglomerate LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton.
Marking the 10-year anniversary of his model, the launch of the Thebe Magugu Suite represents his first foray into inside design, and marks Belmond’s inaugural Designer Residence idea.
Adjoining the suite would be the second location of Magugu Home, which can perform as an idea retailer carrying collections by Magugu and different African designers, a gallery showcasing native artists, and a venue for salon-style occasions, screenings and reveals.
The partnership is a pure extension of Magugu’s relationship with the French luxurious group. Since profitable the LVMH Prize for Younger Designers in 2019, he has designed a capsule assortment for Dior and hosted Champagne Day on behalf of Moët & Chandon. So when Mount Nelson got here calling, he stated sure.
With its signature pink partitions, the 126-year-old resort, set in a backyard property with views onto Desk Mountain, is an area establishment famed for its afternoon tea. “It actually looks like a Wes Anderson scene,” Magugu informed WWD.
A view of the pool at Mount Nelson, a Belmond Lodge.
Inge Prins/Courtesy of Belmond
He was eager to deliver his signature Afro-modern aesthetic to the area, and supply a platform for artists like Zizipho Poswa, whose work is featured in a number of Loewe shops.
“I really feel like my creativity has at all times stretched over and above vogue,” the designer stated. “The core factor that I do is clothes, however I’ve at all times beloved the thought of constructing an area and constructing a universe normally.”
Neal Ludick, Belmond’s director of inside design, stated the goal was to bridge the hole between the colonial-style structure of the property and the resort’s up to date African clientele.
“It was for us crucial to have somebody that’s actually an iconic function mannequin throughout the inventive trade to discover that and be sure that we now have that connection,” he stated.
“There’s some lovely, romantic detailing within the colonial structure, and it’s not one thing that you just wish to lose,” Ludick famous. “What Thebe has finished actually efficiently with the suite is embracing that in a inventive method, however layering onto it.”
Magugu partnered with inside design agency StudioLandt to discover an “Afro-English” aesthetic, juxtaposing British and South African design approaches, with a palette that comes with his signature shades of pistachio and terracotta, and textures of stone and timber.
“I by no means wish to be a wrecking ball. I actually suppose collaborations must be respectful,” he stated. “The tensions and the juxtapositions which have come out from which can be actually fascinating.”
Thebe Magugu on the tennis court docket of Mount Nelson, a Belmond Lodge.
Courtney Patrick/Courtesy of Belmond
The 2-story suite, which features a foyer, lounge and eating space, a bed room with an en-suite toilet and a walk-in wardrobe, shall be furnished with hand-carved furnishings and a curated collection of rotating artworks from native gallery Southern Guild.
These embrace work by Mmangaliso Nzuza, alongside works by Lulama Wolf, Zandile Tshabalala, Banele Khoza, Lorenzo Plaatjies and Trevor Stuurman. Magugu stated he wished the area to be a “snapshot” of African tradition.
“If somebody involves the suite and doesn’t essentially have time to immerse themselves in Cape City or go to this museum and take a look at that location, I virtually need the suite to be a abstract in that sense,” he defined.
The designer, who grew up within the Ipopeng township within the mining city of Kimberley, can be together with loads of private touches.
“I’m working with the resort’s kitchen to create a really distinctive menu impressed by a number of the issues I and my household ate rising up, the issues my grandmother used to cook dinner,” he stated.
Along with the resort tea sommelier, he’s creating customized blends for the suite and has even developed facilities which will develop right into a stand-alone magnificence line.
A view of Mount Nelson, a Belmond Lodge.
Rosie Marks/Courtesy of Belmond
Belmond has beforehand labored with Anderson, the director of “The Grand Budapest Lodge,” on a British Pullman carriage, and with French artist JR aboard the Venice Simplon-Orient-Categorical.
“It’s a really enlightening expertise for me as an architect, since you noticed this uncooked creativity coming alive, whereas with us, once we design, we design inside parameters,” Ludick stated.
With the opening of a second department of Magugu Home, Magugu is beginning to view the model as a spin-off of his vogue line, with the potential to increase into extra areas. “I need my Magugu Home to accommodate creativity and neighborhood normally,” he stated.
He first started working with Mount Nelson in 2022 because the visitor designer for the inaugural version of Confections x Collections, an annual celebration of Pan-African vogue curated by sustainability platform Twyg.
Magugu this 12 months stopped displaying on the normal vogue present calendar in Paris, pausing wholesale to concentrate on his direct-to-consumer enterprise, and praised the resort for offering a much-needed showcase for South African designers.
“I actually love that concept that they’re utilizing their energy and their platform to create environments the place designers can showcase to an unimaginable viewers of high-net-worth people, of media and everybody,” he stated.
Bookings for the Thebe Magugu Suite open from December. “That is such a key milestone for the model, and an ideal milestone to usher within the subsequent 10 years,” Magugu stated.
