ARCHITECTURE & DESIGN

The sophisticated interiors are by UK interior designer Beverley Boswell, who was based in Cape Town and Franschhoek for the duration of the project.

Beverley completed an interior decorating course at Boston House College, Cape Town followed by an internship with David Easton Inc, New York. In her last assignment, Beverley was a senior interior designer with Studio Indigo, London where she focused on bespoke residential projects in London’s über prime localities.

A project in South End, Kensington, which Beverley worked on with Studio Indigo in 2012 prior to Leeu Collection, was nominated as one of the top most inspiring interior design projects in the world recently by design forum ‘Arkitexture’.

For Leeu Collection, Beverley followed a ‘perfect room’ formula which combines aesthetics with practicality throughout the properties.

Originally trained in performing and decorative arts, Franchesca Watson realised her fascination with combining biological life and art by retraining as a landscape designer at the age of 23. Since then she has never lost her obsession with this most ephemeral of art forms.

Franchesca’s commissions range from apartments and residences to private estates and hotels all over southern Africa, to the Seychelles and North America. Well known and in demand for her cool, sophisticated design and stylish planting schemes, the gardens have a certain intangible magic. She is fascinated by the ability of gardens to connect humans and nature, and the process of building gardens that combine beauty, architecture and art with ecologically sound principles. To this end, Franchesca uses processes, materials and plants appropriate to the site and general environment. Her philosophy is that to be truly sustainable, a garden needs to be right first time around, and so she designs to suit the architecture and ambience.

Over the years, she has designed and built gardens in many climatic zones, mostly in contemporary and neo-classical styles, creating gardens that display her innate understanding of drama, architecture and proportion, and using her profound plant knowledge.