Over the past three years, in addition to the demand for housing at all levels, there has been a significant increase in demand for commercial and retail property. Over the same period, Centurion Glass & Aluminium (CGA) has moved from being a supplier to mainly the top-end domestic and smaller commercial developers, to being part of significantly bigger and more complex projects. In addition, CGA has broadened its product offering to include composite aluminium panel cladding and sun louvre systems. Projects which stand out as successes are the revamp of the Toyota Training Academy in Wynburg, in which the existing face brick and steel warehouse structures were spectacularly merged and transformed into a hi-tech, architecturally designed single unit, clad with composite panelling and sun louvre system to deliver a structure with strikingly clean lines.

With composite cladding, not only is the transformation aesthetically significant, but the structure now has an external skin made from one of earth’s most durable materials – aluminium. The Investec Bank building in Pretoria in which performance glass shopfront façades were installed to line up with imported stone cladding, resulted in a visually impressive structure. There has also been a proliferation of motor showrooms, the more creative of which are those of VW Audi. Again the use of lines and angles combined with the maximum use of glass has resulted in eye catching structures as is the case in VW Audi Fourways.

Walls and Roofs magazine - Edition 1, 2007.