...
...
...
The Hollard Campus has been our home since 2005. It’s situated on a landmark property, just below the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital in Parktown.
Our offices were designed to harmonise with the magnificently restored Villa Arcadia – a national heritage site. The offices also blend in beautifully with the surrounding indigenous gardens.
Recognising that everyone should enjoy work and live in a balanced environment, the Hollard Campus is also home to the Hollsome Centre – a wellness facility with a fully equipped gym. The Hollsome Centre also gives Hollardites access to a nurse, doctor, chiropractor, and a beauty therapist.
In addition to the Hollsome Centre, Hollard also boasts an indoor climbing wall, several paid pool tables (the proceeds go to our CSI projects), a foosball table and a large sprung wooden floor which plays host to a variety of sporting activities, such as basketball, indoor football and indoor cricket. All of these activities capture the adventurous spirit of our people and our partners, who also make use of the facilities.
Villa Arcadia’s original owners, Sir Lionel and Lady Florence Phillips, hosted famous guests like General Jan Smuts, Louis Botha and Anton von Wouw, at their home. There’s no doubt that if you were a mover and a shaker in early Jo’burg, you would have been invited to rub shoulders here. Today, Villa Arcadia isn’t just a beautiful historic building with famous works of art – we use this historic landmark home daily to conduct work, meetings and functions.
In a nod to Swiss efficiency, the first building on the site was a pre-fabricated Swiss chalet that was imported “ready to assemble” in 1897 for Carl Rolfes. It was mostly demolished with only the service wing remaining to form part of Villa Arcadia.
The Phillipses commissioned Sir Herbert Baker to design their home. Construction commenced in 1907 and took 18 months to complete. They moved in in 1909. Hollard’s restoration of the building has helped maintain features such as its glam Italian Renaissance palazzo-style marble flooring, grand sweeping stone staircase and the hand-painted Delft tiles adorning Lady Phillips's original bathroom.
At Hollard, art is in our blood. This is evident throughout Villa Arcadia, which houses much of our art collection – mostly contemporary South African art.
Villa Arcadia is one of Parktown’s original “grand old ladies”. Sir Herbert Baker's design concept for Villa Arcadia incorporated European and Cape Dutch styles, whilst retaining his signature H-shape. So vanguard was his style that he was commissioned to design the Union Buildings shortly thereafter.
If it’s wildlife you’re after, you don’t have to venture out of the city. Right here on the Hollard Campus, you’ll find owls, bats, Koi fish and peacocks. We’re also proud to host owl release and water purification projects as part of our environmental programme.
If you take a walk up the hill behind Villa Arcadia, your view will extend from the Saxonwold manmade forest below through to the Magaliesberg mountains in the distance. Sir Herbert Baker, who became one of early Jo’burg’s most famous architects pioneered the sourcing of local materials and use of local craftsmen. As a result, the Villa’s Spanish terracotta roof tiles were specially commissioned from Vereeniging Brick & Clay.
Artist Marlise Keith’s “Rat Race” mosaic installation is eighteen metres in length and exceptionally detailed in its design. Others appreciate it too: it won the Strategic Project Award in the 2011 Business & Arts SA Awards.
Our connection with South Africa’s vulnerable children also dates way back. From 1923, Villa Arcadia was a Jewish orphanage, and home to up to 400 children during the 1930s and 1940s.
Hollard bought the Villa and surrounding 16-acre estate from the orphanage in 2003, and we’re proud to be associated with a special place that carries with it such a noble history.