Eastern Cape · education
Mzimkhulu School Yard
A hard, heat-exposed school ground reorganised around shade islands, rain capture and outdoor teaching.
+41% shaded play area
measured after occupation
Landscape · water · public lifeEst. 2017
Designing what the next season needs.
Places that improve with weather, use and time.
Common Ground Works is a landscape and public-realm studio shaping shade, water, habitat and daily use into durable civic space.
Field study 24-06
Canopy, shade and soil moisture after first winter.
01 / Practice
Landscape is infrastructure people can feel.
We begin with the systems beneath the surface: catchment, soil, shade, movement, maintenance and seasonal change. Form follows those realities rather than competing with them.
Our work spans school grounds, housing landscapes, civic spaces and small private sites where ecological performance has to coexist with ordinary daily use.
We stay involved after handover. Survival rates, worn paths and maintenance behaviour are design information, not somebody else’s problem.
02 / What we do
Services are arranged by the decisions they unlock, not by a package ladder.
- Site strategy
- Read water, wind, access, ecology and use before drawing the public realm.
- Landscape architecture
- Concept through detailed design for civic, residential and institutional landscapes.
- Planting systems
- Resilient palettes, establishment plans and maintenance logic matched to local conditions.
- Water landscapes
- Stormwater, attenuation, infiltration and visible water systems integrated into everyday space.
- Post-occupancy
- Seasonal site reviews that test whether the landscape is actually performing as intended.
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03 / Process
We work by season, not by slide deck.
01
Observe
Walk the site at different times. Record heat, water, desire lines, maintenance and existing life.
02
Set the performance brief
Agree measurable outcomes: shade, canopy, infiltration, access, biodiversity, maintenance effort.
03
Draw & test
Prototype spatial moves against budgets, engineering, nursery availability and real maintenance capacity.
04
Return
Review the living system after occupation and adapt what did not behave as expected.
04 / Selected work
Three landscapes, three different problems.
Each project is shown as a performance story, not a gallery of identical cards.
Gqeberha · public realm
Station Rain Garden
A neglected traffic edge converted into a linear stormwater garden that intercepts runoff before it reaches the street inlet.
68 m³ event storage
measured after occupation
East London · housing
Courtyard 18
A compact shared courtyard built around edible planting, laundry movement, seating and low-maintenance shade.
32 plant species
measured after occupation
82%
plant survival after first summer
27
post-occupancy walks completed
11
municipal and school partners
4.6 ha
new permeable landscape delivered
06 / Studio table
People around the drawing.
Anele Jacobs
Landscape architect · water systems
Mira Naidoo
Planting designer · ecology
Tumi Biko
Technologist · documentation
Jon Bell
Site lead · post-occupancy
07 / Field notes
Useful observations from built ground.
NOTE 01
Shade is a programme, not an amenity
How canopy placement changes where children wait, eat and gather between formal activities.
NOTE 02
Designing for the person with the hose
Maintenance staff often know the site’s failure modes before the project team does. Invite them early.
NOTE 03
A rain garden is not a decorative ditch
Three details that separate functioning stormwater landscapes from planting beds that happen to get wet.
08 / Questions
Before the first site walk.
Do you only work on large sites?
No. Our smallest commissions are courtyards and school grounds. The threshold is not area; it is whether landscape performance matters to the brief.
Can you work with an existing architect?
Yes. Most projects are collaborative. We can enter at concept, planning, detailed design or post-occupancy stages.
Do you specify indigenous planting only?
We prioritise ecologically appropriate and climate-resilient species. Indigenous planting leads the palette, but performance, maintenance and local nursery availability shape final mixes.
What does post-occupancy involve?
Seasonal site walks, survival-rate checks, irrigation adjustment and a one-year performance note for the client and maintenance team.
East London · Eastern Cape
Landscape strategy through post-occupancy
Fictional identity for the Interlink catalogue