Events and Exhibitions
WOMEN IN THE BUILT
ENVIRONMENT GROWS EXPONENTIALLY
By Benjamin Brits
After the successful delivery of the women in the built environment ( WIBE ) networking event earlier this year , this second event grew in both promotion and participation .
On this occasion , the drivers to deliver and expand the concept of Fourways Group in partnership with Samsung South Africa gained further traction by support from Co-Arc International Architects , 1 st Thursday Property Club , Impact Manpower , and Turner & Townsend .
This event seeks to provide an opportunity to promote the built environment as an inclusive profession that supports , values and celebrates the contributions of women engineers , architects , developers , designers , surveyors , HVAC professionals , and the likes thereof .
The event was held at the Samsung Bespoke Centre at the Design Quarter in Fourways and approximately 100 women were in attendance from various sectors within the built environment .
Charmaine Pieters - national key accounts manager at Samsung ( Digital Air Solutions ), managed the formal proceedings and started them off by commenting on the excellent positive energy of the group and further offered thanks to all of the people involved in the organising and delivery of the event .
She moved on to highlight the impressive cutting edge technology that Samsung offers holistically and went into some detail about three air conditioning products in particular – namely WindFree technology and its various benefits and functions to deliver draft-free cooling and managing indoor air quality that she stated “ can be up to five times more polluted than outdoor air ,” their 360 cassette unit , and then their multi-split FJM range where the ability to connect a single outdoor condensing unit to multiple indoor units is becoming important for developments to avoid the typical “ outdoor unit clusters seen from the past .” “ With the rising energy costs in South Africa , Samsung strives to make its appliances more energy efficient . For example , the WindFree air conditioners feature digital inverter boost technology that minimises the unit ’ s energy consumption by up to 77 % compared to conventional fixed-speed air conditioners ,” she added .
Pieters then introduced Catharine Atkins – director , and Malika Walele – professional architect from Co-Arc International Architects that shared some of their work over the last few years and stressed the “ importance of diversification in teams that lead to
Image credits : © RACA Journal | Benjamin Brits
One of the projects that was presented by Co-Arc International Architects was on the Leonardo – the 57-floor high-rise mixed-use building now known as the tallest building in Africa .
The speakers at the event . From left : Catharine Atkins – director at Co-Arc International Architects , Malika Walele – professional architect at Co-Arc International Architects , Wendy Cerutti – director and head of cost management at Turner & Townsend , Jay Dax – co-founder at 1st Thursday Property Club , Charmaine Pieters - national key accounts manager at Samsung , Doné Dunkley – co-founder at 1st Thursday Property Club and Mpumi Sishi – managing director at Impact Manpower .
www . refrigerationandaircon . co . za RACA Journal I October 2022 21