There’s something ancient and unhurried about the desert. A landscape stripped back to its essentials, warm earth, dry air, the long shadows of late afternoon. It's a place that asks nothing of you but stillness.
Dust & Clay is our ode to that. A palette drawn from sun-baked terrain, fired clay, and the layered tones of things worn beautifully by time.
This edition serves as an inspirational guide to bring warmth into your space. Rich colours, natural and handcrafted elements, and bold colour drenching bring the vision to life.
Dust & Clay is our ode to that. A palette drawn from sun-baked terrain, fired clay, and the layered tones of things worn beautifully by time.
This edition serves as an inspirational guide to bring warmth into your space. Rich colours, natural and handcrafted elements, and bold colour drenching bring the vision to life.
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Right now, we’re all about terracotta.
Rising from the floor, our backdrop is dressed in CreteCote Microcement Terracotta, a tone that needs no introduction in a desert narrative. Sun-warmed and unmistakably earthy, Terracotta brings the heat of fired clay indoors, wrapping the space in the kind of colour that shifts subtly with the light throughout the day.
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At the centre of the scene, a cylindrical plinth, formed from polystyrene, strengthened with our EIFS Basecoat and glass-fibre mesh, and finished in CreteCote Microcement Terracotta demonstrates something central to Cemcrete's philosophy: that our products are not limited to floors and walls.
CreteCote Microcement can be used to coat custom-made furniture, countertops, and light fixtures, just to name a few. Polystyrene forms the perfect base for custom pieces like this, paired with the EIFS Basecoat, it becomes a hard, durable, and lightweight furniture piece. |
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The final layer belongs to RenoCrete in Oyster, worked with CreteStain in Rust, Albany, and Burnt Amber using a dry-brush aging technique. Here, the surface becomes something closer to memory, the look of a wall that has absorbed decades of desert sun, where colour has settled into texture and time has done its own finishing work. The three CreteStain tones layer and bleed into one another, building a depth that no single colour could achieve alone. It is, perhaps, the most evocative surface in this guide: raw, atmospheric, and entirely alive.
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To bring this scene to life, we collaborated with two South African makers whose work is as rooted in the earth as the palette itself. From Klay (SCAPE's Brand of the Year 2025), we have clay brick cylindrical cladding and breeze blocks that speak directly to the architectural soul of the desert, where raw material and honest construction have always been enough.
For a handmade, perfectly imperfect touch, we brought in Storm Ceramics, each piece a celebration of craft, warm in tone and honest in form.
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KLAY
What began close to 60 years ago as a family-owned brick manufacturing business has evolved into one of South Africa's most innovative architectural product manufacturers. Founded by Garnet de la Hunt and later expanded together with his son Julian, the company built a strong reputation within the clay brick industry before the next generation joined the business and helped further grow its vision. Inspired by international trends and a passion for material innovation, Klay invested in specialised manufacturing capabilities and extensive product development. The result was Klay Concept, a natural progression that combines traditional craftsmanship with modern design thinking. Today, Klay offers a curated range of architectural bricks, screens, pavers and finishes designed to inspire architects, designers and homeowners alike. |
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STORM CERAMICS
Storm Ceramics has spent over fifteen years doing something that cannot be rushed, making ceramics by hand, one piece at a time, on the potter's wheel. Their work is rooted in a deep respect for tradition. Drawing inspiration from the ceremonial vessels of Africa, each piece is thoughtfully re-imagined for contemporary living, honouring the quiet splendour of the past without being bound by it. To support this vision, they developed their own proprietary clay body, engineered for strength and carrying a distinctive warmth that radiates through every glaze. What sets them apart is a refusal to compromise. In a world of mass production, they remain committed to the handmade, to ceramics that are fully functional, distinctively durable, and genuinely reflective of Africa's natural beauty and cultural richness. |
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Dust & Clay is a reminder that warmth is not only a feeling, it is a finish, a tone, a texture. It is the colour of the earth beneath your feet and the clay walls that have sheltered people for centuries. These are surfaces with memory. These are spaces that endure.
