Looking down on Johannesburg: an exploration of rooftop spaces in the regenerated city

Abstract

Exclusive rooftop spaces in Johannesburg have become popular within the city, particularly owing to the ongoing processes of regeneration occurring within it. Their existence is based on the need for the upper to middle classes to experience what it means to be in the city. By attending events at rooftop spaces in the areas of the Maboneng Precinct and Braamfontein, I sought to read the city from above, in order to understanding how these spaces contribute to how the city is experienced. The four chosen field sites of Dukes, Seascape, the InterUrban Rooftop and the Open Air Cinema all enable a different reading of what it is to be in the city. The process of research revealed an interesting discussion about the temporal entry into the city, the new forms of gated communities, the capitalisation of the deep house genre of music at rooftop spaces, the right to the city, and the surprisingly profound role that social media plays in how the virtual and real worlds manifest in order to promote rooftop spaces as popular places to visit. These themes along with an insight into how the experiences and views of each field site enables one to reflect on the city of Johannesburg are explored. Overall, it can be said that rooftop spaces enable the middle to upper class a subjective experience of city life, one that posits Johannesburg as an object over which to gaze.