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the curator
Volume 18 (Embrace), Spring 2025
A well-known fashion designer duo have created the perfect expression of themselves in their gallery-style penthouse in Fresnaye
Words by Georgia Black Photography by Elsa Young a Frank Features Production
The façade of Clarens House is intentionally enigmatic. ‘We wanted it to be a slightly intimidating, uncertain presence that didn’t read as an apartment block,’ says Christiaan. ‘The swimming pool is our indulgence, hanging off the side of the building,’ says Malcolm. ‘It is where we do our best thinking, talking and planning. An undulating metal sculpture by Rodan Kane Hart stands guard.
‘Our failed attempt at minimalism’ is how Malcolm Klûk and Christiaan Gabriël du Toit describe the style of their Fresnaye penthouse. The attempt is noted though. The duo’s trademark eclectic abundance has evolved into a honed, disciplined collection with every object that remains a reflection of their personal evolution.
For the fashion designers are no longer just that. For two decades they were known as the designers of KlûK CGDT couture and ready-to-wear. In 2014 they decided to develop a block on Bree Street, which would include their eponymous three-storey store ‘inspired by Valentino’s atelier’. This marked a turning point. They stopped marching to the drum of a four-seasons-a-year fashion business, added a masterly curation of art and interiors and reconsidered what it meant to be ‘designers’. At this point their Fresnaye house, which is set on an unusually large plot a few minutes’ walk from the beachfront, was in urgent need of an upgrade. Really, they wanted to live in a hotel room with views, a pool, and a small patch of lawn for their beloved dog Yohji. And they wanted another building project.
Ten years later, their seamless indoor-outdoor penthouse – the crowning glory of the nine apartments in their Clarens House development – has panoramic views of Lion’s Head, Signal Hill and Sea Point. It faces north but has it all. You’d be forgiven for mistaking the building for something else – a gallery perhaps. Which is precisely the point. ‘We wanted this to be a slightly intimidating, uncertain presence that didn’t read as an apartment block, and that ran counter to the developments cropping up around the city, which seemed more obvious than something we would do,’ says Christiaan.
Their design process means following the trail of things that talk to them, big and small. The YSL museum in Marrakech. A glass building in Tokyo. The original red-roofed houses of Sea Point that informed the colour of the custom-made facebricks. A particular pink pulled from a peeling wall in Portugal, then matched to a colour fittingly named ‘Morning Clarens’, the same name as the street.
They worked for the second time with dynamic young architects Annemie van den Heever and Christiaan van Aswegen of Hours Clear Architects, who were excited to push boundaries, use unconventional materials and find alternatives where there were restrictions. Constraint informs creativity in the global south, where, says Klûk, you’ve got to be cleverer and braver with your choices because you don’t have the luxury of developing in dollars. The slate floor, with the odd piece of marble and granite, is a case in point. ‘We wanted luxurious marble crazy paving but that wasn’t going to happen,’ says Christiaan. The world loves – even mythologises – a designer couple. ‘Viktor and Rolf have had a huge influence on us, for their way of thinking,’ says Malcolm. ‘They launched a grenade-shaped perfume bottle that could not be opened. Their store was upside down. I think my admiration for them is a throwback to my youth. I never wanted to be a cliché of the gay designer; I wanted to be recognised for how I think.’
They talk about everything, often from their raised, round swimming pool. ‘It’s our home office come rain or shine,’ says Christiaan. After 24 years they are well-synched, even the same person it seems sometimes, yet there are roles: Christiaan is detail-oriented, reading the fine print, marking where the plugs and switches go and which style architrave goes around a door; Malcolm’s innate talent is forecasting. ‘He’s a voracious reader of everything,’ says Christiaan, ‘and has an eye for what’s coming.’ This is especially evident when it comes to furniture and art, particularly sculpture. He’s often early to the party, having been the first collector of work by Cape Town artist Diana Vives. ‘Occasionally a piece has slipped in behind Christiaan’s back,’ laughs Malcolm – a Jan Ernst candelabra, a lilac Cameron Platter chair, a metal sculpture by Kyle Moreland. ‘I tell him it’s “on display” in the shop, meanwhile I’m busy paying it off.’ They are at once both magpies and serious collectors – road-tripping, scrolling and trawling through dusty lots in search of furniture and objects that are often invisible to the unhoned eye. In a world saturated with ‘good taste’ imagery, sometimes we crave the opposite – that danger zone of objects that are ugly-
beautiful. It’s Malcolm’s sweet spot.
Christiaan leans out of the kitchen hatch, which is flanked by the same mirrored panels and overlooks the pool area. The dusty pink paint colour of Clarens House is aptly titled ‘Morning Clarens’ and was inspired by a fragment of peeling paint found on a wall in Portugal.
‘We love looking, and we particularly love figuring out how we can contemporise something,’ says Malcolm. ‘We’ve taken the flue of a chimney and made it into a coffee table because it was the most beautiful brass shape.’ Their dining tables – a pair of rhomboid-shaped office desks bought on Facebook Marketplace for a song, then sprayed high-gloss nude – can be configured for a dinner for two or 10. The inspiration came from the Vogue Italia stand at the Milan Furniture Fair.
‘Christiaan and I are both motivated by integrity and authenticity. This is what drew me to him,’ says Malcolm, who doesn’t shy away from the hard stuff. ‘I can’t pretend to be not Jewish, or not gay, not South African, or not white.’ But overlaying everything, there is beauty. ‘We can only progress through innovation and creativity and that’s our mission.’
‘Who is Lucky Like Me?’ reads an artwork by young artist Luca Evans, commissioned by Malcolm for their anniversary one year. It’s become something they often say to each other.
‘I’ve always loved Cameron Platter’s work. It’s irreverent and surreal – a little like us. The shape of this lilac chair is also intrinsically local and an icon of all our lives growing up. It says a lot about who Christiaan and I are,’ says Malcolm. Opposite ‘We wanted a dark room, so matched the curtains to the walls and floors. The bed is a mid-century piece, it was cream vinyl and we recovered it in leather so it matched the colour scheme. Next to the bed behind the curtain is a wood collage by Oficina Marques we bought in Lisbon. We love that it’s a surprise behind the curtain and something only for us to see. The red chair is by Marc Newsom, recently featured on the series Severance. We bought it at a prop-house auction.’
Order House and Leisure Volume 18 (Embrace) for more spaces that reflect the personalities of their makers.