Cape Town is a unique city of beauty shaped by its history, people and in particular by its natural setting and cultural resources. The city has a rich heritage of buildings and urban environments, places of memory, struggle history sites as well as natural, rural and cultural landscapes.
This urban heritage includes the beginnings of the city such as the Company’s Garden and the Castle, the early houses of the Bo-Kaap as well as distinct suburbs such as Woodstock and Kalk Bay. It also includes, for example, the Table Mountain range, the winelands, vleis and wetlands. Places of memory connected with pre-colonial heritage, slave history and the struggle for democracy are integral to the city’s heritage.
Since 1977 the City of Cape Town has commissioned a series of heritage audits and conservation studies of many of the historically and architecturally significant parts of the city. There are currently more than 33 000 listed heritage sites on the Heritage Inventory, including 34 urban conservation (heritage) areas which have been established:
- Upper Table Valley Areas
- Sea Point - St Bedes - Green Point
- Central City
- Loader Street, Waterkant
- Wandel Street, Lower Gardens
- Maynard Street, Lower Gardens
- Chapel Street, Woodstock
- Cavendish Square, Woodstock
- Queens Road , Woodstock
- Regent Street, Woodstock
- Roodebloem Road, Woodstock
- Chester/Coronation Street, Woodstock
- Albert Road, Woodstock
- Victoria Road, Woodstock
- Salt River
- Upper Observatory
- Lower Observatory
- Belmont Road, Rondebosch
- St Michael’s, Rondebosch
- Lower Rouwkoop Road, Rondebosch
- Westerford, Rondebosch
- Mowbray - Rosebank
- Little Mowbray
- Mowbray Station
- Upper Rondebosch
- Wynberg Village
- Silwood
- Muizenberg Village
- Atlantic/Beach Road, Muizenberg
- Royal/Beach Road, Muizenberg
- Muizenberg - St James - Kalk Bay
- Simon’s Town
- Clifton, Glen Beach and Bakoven Bungalows
- Pinelands
Areas in Claremont, Harfield Village and Newlands Village have also been identified as “Special Areas” due to their heritage value.
Some further areas under investigation or proposed for listing as future Heritage (conservation) Areas include parts of Bo-Kaap, Lower Rosebank, Wynberg, Langa, Mamre (see Mamre Revitalisation Project), Philadelphia, Somerset West, Gordon’s Bay, Philippi, Vredehoek & Upper Table Valley, Sir Lowry’s Village, Durbanville and Macassar, as well as the Winelands Cultural Landscapes of Constantia Valley, Durbanville Hills, Lourens River Valley and Eerste River.
The City of Cape Town has developed guidelines for development within these special areas in the form of Heritage Advice Pamphlets.