The Lodge

Built low, so the ridge stays the ridge.

Malandra was designed around a single rule: nothing on the ridge may stand taller than the trees. Everything else followed from that.

The way in: a pale gravel path between low walls of dry-stacked sandstone, leading to a tall timber pivot door under a deep flat roof, the cliffs beyond, in the morning — The way in: a gravel path between walls of the ridge’s own stone.

01 · The ridge

Eighteen hundred hectares, and one ridge.

Malandra stands on the western edge of the Waterberg, on a private reserve that was cattle land until 1994. The grass has come back, and with it kudu, eland, giraffe, and a pair of brown hyena seen about once a year.

The lodge keeps to one sandstone ridge. The rest belongs to the bush, and to the people who walk it with a guide.

Low pavilions of sandstone strung along a ridge at dawn, small in the landscape, above a valley full of mist

02 · The build

Stone from where it stands.

The sandstone was split on site, from the ground the main pavilion now sits on, and laid dry by masons from Vaalwater who had built farm walls in the valley for forty years.

The roofs are flat and deep so the walls stay in shade. The floors are smoked oak and honed stone. The plaster is lime, which breathes in the heat and softens as it ages. Nothing was chosen to look new for long.

The main lounge, with a full-height sandstone fireplace wall, linen sofas, leather armchairs and a wall of glass onto the valley

Close-up of the sandstone wall, laid dry in thin courses

“Fewer rooms, so that every evening can be unhurried.”

The brief for the lodge, in its entirety

03 · The people

Seven suites, thirty‑one people.

There are more people looking after Malandra than there are guests staying, and almost all of them are from the valley: the guides and trackers, the kitchen, the housekeepers who iron the linen by hand. Many have been here since the first stone was laid.

You will learn their names quickly. They will already know yours.

Dusk on the raised oak boardwalk, low bronze lanterns glowing along its edge and a suite pavilion lit at the end of the path

1,800hectares of private reserve
16guests at most, in seven suites
31people, most from the valley
0diesel generators running by day

Looking after the place

Quietly, and without a slogan.

Sun by day
Solar panels on the workshop roof run the lodge from sunrise to sunset, with batteries for the evening.
Water from the ground
Borehole water is filtered on site; what drains from the showers goes back to the indigenous gardens.
Nothing to throw away
No plastic bottles: water comes in glass, refilled in the kitchen, and the coffee in clay cups.
The levy, spent here
The R220 conservation levy pays for the reserve’s anti-poaching patrols and the upkeep of its fences.

Stay with us

Two nights, or a week. The valley keeps.

Rates are per person, per night, sharing, and include every meal, two guided outings a day, local wine, beer, spirits and soft drinks.

From R7,450

Check availability

Eighteen hundred hectares, and one ridge.

Stone from where it stands.

Seven suites, thirty‑one people.

Quietly, and without a slogan.

Sun by day

Water from the ground

Nothing to throw away

The levy, spent here

Two nights, or a week. The valley keeps.