From the 1850s onwards the District Six area, so called because in 1867 the area was created as the sixth Municipal District of Cape Town, developed into a dense residential area.
Home to almost a tenth of the city of Cape Town’s population, it became a lively and hugely diverse community.
The congregational Church in Buitenkant Street was built in 1830 and 1860 the church hall was added to the rear of the church. In 1906 the original church was demolished to make way for the building of warehouse space but the church hall has remained and became incorporated into the Sacks Futeran warehouse development.
As a textile and soft goods supplier, the Sacks Futeran building was central to the District Six area. Seamstresses, tailors and generations of families frequented the warehouse and many visitors and workers in the new Fugard Theatre have memories of their childhood visits.
In 2002 the Sacks Futeran complex was gifted to the District Six Museum. While Isango Portobello makes its home at the Fugard Theatre the Museum is developing and restoring the rest of the complex to house the Home Coming Centre, gallery space and offices.
On 11th February 1966, the apartheid government declared Cape Town’s District Six a Whites Only area. In the years that followed over 60,000 people were forcibly removed from their homes as and the area bulldozed. The area today still remains, for the most part, empty, sort of cesarean scar on one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Cesarean scar because the community of District Six represented the birth of the new South Africa, long before the term ‘Rainbow Nation’ was ever used.
Athol Fugard is without doubt South Africa’s most important and inspirational theatre worker. As early as the 1950s he was working in non-racial environments. His worked helped underline the stupidity and barbarity of the then political system, often with great humour and always with great humanity. For him to consent to give his name, and what it represents to this space is a link from the optimistic theatrical past into this democratic future. It is a great honour for Isango Portobello.
So why build the theatre here in District Six? There are practical reasons that made the location of our new home very accessible – transport is made a little easier by being close to the town centre and we are to be located in a newly designated ‘cultural zone’ - but the real reason is that for Cape Town, District Six remains one of apartheid’s biggest monuments. We hope that, by building a theatre for all the people of South Africa in District Six, we will help to pull this down when we open the doors to the Fugard Theatre.
Mark Dornford-May, Pauline Malefane, Mannie Manim, Eric Abraham