page_title: Mutual Building
section_title: The "new" (1940) Head Office in Darling Street
hierarchical_section_title: Mutual Building / History / The "new" (1940) Head Office in Darling Street
caption_attribution_description: English: A section of the Frieze that surrounds the Mutual Building in Cape Town
context_page_description: The Mutual Building, in Cape Town, South Africa, was built as the headquarters of the South African Mutual Life Assurance Society, now the "Old Mutual" insurance and financial services company. It was opened in 1940, but before the end of the 1950s—less than 20 years later—business operations were already moving to another new office at Mutual Park in Pinelands; since then Old Mutual has become an international business and their present head office is in London.
  The building is a fine example of art deco architecture and design, and it has many interesting internal features such as the banking hall, assembly room, directors' board room; external features include a dramatic ziggurat structure, prismoid windows, and one of the longest carved stone friezes in the world. It has been said that it provides evidence of the colonial attitudes of the time, and the "ideals of colonial government promulgated by Rhodes in the late nineteenth century".
  The Mutual Building is now converted to residential use, although some parts of the building are used commercially. For example, the Banking Hall and the retail shops that operate outside on the ground level.
context_section_description: In the 1930s it became clear that a new headquarters building was needed and very ambitious targets were set for the building: it was to be the tallest building in South Africa (possibly in the whole continent of Africa, with the exception of the pyramids in Egypt), it was to have the fastest lifts, it was to have the largest windows. At the same time it was to epitomise the values of the business: "Strength, Security and Confidence in the Future"; this demanded a combination of traditional and contemporary design.
  Although it is clearly identified on the exterior as the "Mutual Building" (or "Mutual Gebou" in Afrikaans) it is often familiarly referred to as "The Old Mutual Building". Here, in the body of this article, it will be referred to as the "Mutual Building", thereby acknowledging the nomenclature on the exterior of the building itself.
caption: The name of the building in English and in Afrikaans ("Mutual Gebou"): The interesting frieze shown here is described in the text
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