2 Best Sights in City Center, Johannesburg

If there's a symbol of Johannesburg, it's Ponte City, a massive, hollow 54-story cylinder of apartments that you might recall from watching District 9. Built in 1975, and standing at a height of 568 feet with a flashing advertisement at the top, it was, until recently, the tallest residential building in Africa. Once the apex of grand living, it became a slum in the 1990s as the middle class fled to the suburbs. It has since been revitalized, with young professionals, students, and immigrants moving in.

The Dlala Nje Foundation, on the ground floor of the building, is a safe space and community center for the neighborhood’s youth. It is funded by the four fascinating tours offered by the Dlala Nje Experiences Business, which takes visitors on walking tours of the inner city’s misunderstood suburbs. Leave all your prejudices behind as you explore Hillbrow, Yeoville, and Berea on a culinary, shopping, or queer tour, where you can interact with locals, many of whom are small-business owners, to gain a refreshed perspective on this vastly diverse city.

Victoria Yards is an urban renewal project on the fringe of the inner city that has reimagined abandoned warehouses into a mixed-use lifestyle complex. It supports the surrounding community through its three on-site nonprofits and urban farming project, while locals and tourists explore the 50-odd artists’ workshops, decor showrooms, galleries, and fashion outlets housed in its brick-face buildings. The driving force behind Victoria Yards is sustainability, with tenants making designer bags from vibrant shweshwe fabric (a printed cotton fabric) and plastic waste, homeware made from recycled industrial parts, upcycled pre-loved clothing, and a sorbet stand that buys overripe, unsold fruit from community street-side sellers to make frozen desserts.

If your appetite gets the better of you on a visit, there’s an old-school "tuck shop," coffee roastery, and bakery that stands shoulder-to-shoulder to a small-batch gin distillery, as well as a bar, and a traditional walk-in fish-and-chips shop with wooden benches arranged in the courtyard. Although it’s open 7 days a week, the First Sunday Market (first Sunday of the month, 10 am–4 pm) hosts a collection of additional vendors who sell everything from collectibles, antiques, and handmade African curios to food and drink. There is free, undercover parking available, as well as overflow on-street parking with parking guards, making it safe to visit on your own.