NCHERS

Aubrey & Kim Springveldt
Aubrey & Kim Springveldt at home 2015, photographed by Terry-Jo Thorne

Kim & Aubrey Springveldt

Kim & Aubrey Springveldt’s story is one of enduring love against the enormous obstacles which the apartheid government threw at them. 

Meeting in 1983 when they both taught at the same Mitchell’s Plain school, Aubrey & Kim were married in December three years later and their differing ethnicities saw the government attempting to evict them from their property at every turn. They faced trouble even sharing a car together, and around 1988 their trouble with the police became more intensive as a result of attempted evictions.

They were forced out of their flat in Lansdowne because of their differing backgrounds, and it was, after months of unsuccessful searching for a home, that they had the good fortune of finding a home in Claremont in 1989. The two found a place in one of the outlying areas where evictions weren’t occuring and the neighbours did not protest having to live beside a ‘mixed-race’ couple. At this late stage, they managed to evade the forced evictions occuring throughout the 60s & 70s in Claremont.


The two have been married for 28 years and still reside in the same home which they found in Claremont in 1989. They have two daughters, Amy & Charlotte, and four children from Aubrey’s first marriage: Carmen, Werner, Ulrich & Ute.