African Design Magazine November 2014 | Page 24

Caesarstone announces Kitchen Designers of the Year Kim Hansen and Beth Gillitt took the title of Caesarstone Kitchen Designers of 2014, also winning R50,000 each for their innovative kitchen designs in the Comfort and Luxury categories respectively. Beth Gillitt won the title in 2012, while Kim Hansen was a 2012 finalist. Both designers hail from Kitchen Classics, Durban, with Beth recently moving to Abu Dhabi after being headhunted for a kitchen design position there. Every year Caesarstone invites South African kitchen designers to submit their year’s kitchen designs featuring Caesarstone for a chance to win amazing media exposure as well as enticing prize money. The judging process is blind and completely independent, preventing bias towards any design company or designer. This year entrants had to submit their kitchen designs into one of two categories depending on their overall value – Comfort (under R100 000 in value) and Luxury (over R100 000 in value). Having flown all the way from Dubai for the awards ceremony, Beth was thrilled to take the title once again, “I can’t believe it – winning this competition has been really unexpected, but such a blessing as it’s opened up significant opportunities for me.” Beth’s Luxury category winning kitchen features Beth’s signature Caesarstone Shitake and timber accents in an innovative island. Competition judge and editor of House & Garden magazine, Liz Morris, had this to say about Beth’s winning design, “The winning entry was a really cleverly designed kitchen, apart from a great use of Caesarstone – in fact, it was the most inventive and design-forward use of the product.” Liz continues, “The winning Luxury kitchen has an amazing layout, it is very user friendly and cook friendly. The other thing we thought was great was the combination of finishes and materials, which were on trend.” Judge Bradley van den Berg, producer of Top Billing and the Expresso Morning Show, says, “This kitchen had many ticks in my boxes: I enjoyed the use of materials; I liked that it was warm; I liked the contrast of materials and I also liked the fact that it brought a lot of light into the kitchen with the use of the.................. Click here to read the rest of the article 24 africandesignmagazine.com