The most famous mid-century-modernist glass box houses are, more than anything, architectural tributes to nature.
Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House and Philip Johnson’s Glass House might have been experiments in the cutting-edge use of concrete, steel and glass, but they were romantic more than industrial: part house, part garden pavilion, part shrine. The De Wit family’s glass pavilion in the Cradle of Humankind – the rolling grasslands northwest of Johannesburg in South Africa and home to humankind’s most ancient origins – pays tribute to these two landmark homes. Scroll through the gallery below (Photograhpy: Greg Cox | Bureaux; Production: Sven Alberding | Bureaux) to dive into the alluring environment: