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DTSTART;TZID=UTC:20250912T173000
DTEND;TZID=UTC:20250912T210000
DTSTAMP:20260916T214759
CREATED:20250811T121309Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250811T121309Z
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SUMMARY:Louis Michel Thibault - THE FATHER OF SOUTH AFRICAN ARCHITECTURE
DESCRIPTION:Please join us in The Garden Room\, The Plettenberg\, Church Street\, Plettenberg Bay\, on Friday 12thSeptember 2025.\nRodney Grosskopff\, well- known Plett raconteur\, renowned architect and amateur historian\, returns to the podium to tell us about Louis Michel Thibault\, one of South Africa’s greatest architects. \nBorn 1750 in Picquigny\, France\, a small town on the River Somme\, near Amien\, little is known of his early life but he must have been affected by the architecture around him. \nHe enrolled at the Royal Academy of Architecture in Paris and proved to be a brilliant student\, winning prizes and being selected to present his design for the coat of arms of the Academy to King Louis XV. \nHe then went on to study military engineering and joined a Swiss mercenary regiment. \nThe Dutch East India Company (VOC) employed the mercenaries to guard the Cape against possible invasion by the British. \nThibault arrived in the Cape in 1783. \nAfter peace was declared he remained in the Cape and he set up a private architectural practice. \nLouis Michel Thibault was the first formally trained architect to practice in South Africa and was certainly  the premier architect of his time. \nTempered by local taste and  his use of local labour and building materials\, he did more than anyone to establish an architectural style which could be called “ South African”. \nHis collaboration with Anton Anreith\, a young sculptor and woodcarver from Freiburg\, and Hermann Schutte a young architect and builder from Bremen\, produced several prestigious projects including the Lodge de Goeie Hoop which is today part of the parliamentary complex. \nThe Drostdy in Graaff-Reinet is also a beautifully preserved example of  Thibault’s work built in 1804.  The building is still in use as a five-star hotel. \nUnfortunately many of his works were demolished. \nThibault died on 3/11/1815 from bronchopneumonia caused by exposure while surveying properties along the road from Cape Town to Simon’s Town. \nHe was buried in a self-designed plain Masonic tomb in the Somerset Street Cemetery which was later demolished to make way for lower Buitengracht. \nHis mortal remains and plaque could not be found. \n 
URL:https://pletthistory.org/event/louis-michel-thibault-the-father-of-south-african-architecture/
LOCATION:The Garden Room\,  The Plettenberg\, Church Street\,  Plettenberg Bay\, Plettenberg Bay\, Western Cape\, 6600\, South Africa
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://pletthistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Picture1.jpg
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