Subscribe to daily business and company news across 19 industries We have a wonderful Pretoria-based job opportunity for a talented, junior to mid-weight Integrated Digital Designer at an established production company specialising in video production and live streaming. We are looking for a talented and committed Designer, who is enthusiastic about their craft and explores alternative solutions. Among other tasks, your responsibilities will include creating marketing material such as promotional graphics, online graphics, social media posts, posters, as well as programmes and presentations that accompany our virtual events and production ventures. The ideal candidate will have strong creative skills and a portfolio of work that demonstrates passion for illustrative design and typography. Go on and show us your portfolio Pretoria creatives! Responsibilities
Receiving a brief, and maybe an outline for the design request
Conduct research on the subject where and when needed
Determine, decide, and manipulate text and visual elements
Study the clients’ branding manual and understand it
Prepare designs ideas and concepts where and when needed
Illustrate and design graphics for video, live productions, production sets and social media
Collaborate with the team to ensure consistency of designs across various media outlets
Maintain awareness of current industry and technology standards, social media, competitive landscape, and market trends
Requirements The successful candidate must have/be:
Recognised Tertiary qualification in Visual Communications and/or Information Design
A minimum of 2 years’ experience in designing in an in-house or corporate environment
Extensive working knowledge of Adobe design software i.e., Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign
Experience in After Effects is highly advantageous
Strong communication, conceptual thinking, typography skills and design skills
A natural ability to understand design and design balance
Understand branding rules and guidelines
Creativity
Attention to detail and professional mindset
Self-driven
Proactive and eager to create and establish new initiatives Fluent in English and pay attention to grammar and spelling
Passion for creating video editing
Continuous need to improve every project
Able to handle extreme pressure and take initiative in stressful environments
Understand that product quality is a result of teamwork
Responsible with expensive equipment
Top-notch time-management skills
Multitasker.
Please submit a PDF/link to a relevant portfolio along with your CV on application. Should you not receive a response within 10 days, please consider your application unsuccessful. VGP Recruitment is a specialist recruitment agency in the advertising, marketing, media, creative, digital, PR/communications and publishing industries.
Good news for creative entrepreneurs in Cape Town is that the Craft + Design Institute (CDI) and V&A Waterfront is calling for a new group of Cape Town-based creative entrepreneurs to apply for their local retail readiness programme for 2022/23. If selected, the programme provides a full retail experience at an incubator store, known as the Design Lab, which is located at the V&A’s design-forward Watershed shopping venue. It’s an incredible opportunity for local designers to receive the necessary support to experience a real-time retail environment, try their hand at selling and test products in the market. The programme also unlocks free training covering pricing, packaging, merchandising, product development and much more. In its current iteration, running from 2021 to September 2022, the programme is working with several creative brands and individuals whose products are showcased and sold at this living retail “design laboratory”. Current participants include Nondwe Nyathi, Jenine Allchin, Anele Nono, Malibongwe Nohesi, Ado Ludidi, Sizwe Shumane, and Richard Mandongwe, who are now graduating as they exit the programme in the next few months. “For me to be here at Design Lab is a big thing for me,” says Shumane. “Ever since I started making my art here in Cape Town my wish was to come to the Watershed to sell my designs. I make a sale every time I am here, especially my rings. People love my rings – and the brooches! This has pushed me to come up with other new designs.” After this incredible learning experience ends for the first cohort, these participants will be well prepared for their next commercial steps in the form of future market stalls and outlets, as well as potentially their own space at the Watershed. They will continue to receive mentorship and support opportunities from the CDI. For the next intake of Design Lab participants, CDI and V&A Waterfront are looking to identify 4 to 5 new designers to move through the programme, commencing mid-year with training and with the selected creative entrepreneurs entering the Design Lab store in September 2022 for one year. Once again, the newly selected designers will gain hands-on experience running a store and receive dedicated support through training and mentorship provided by the CDI. “We’re looking to support a fresh crop of talented local designers who have the drive and passion to run their own retail spaces,” says Fran Stewart, who runs the Design Lab programme and is the CDI’s manager for Market Access. “We are focussed on enhancing the sustainability and growth potential of the selected creative entrepreneurs; helping them with dedicated support to hold their own successfully and confidently in the marketplace. The V&A Waterfront’s Watershed has consistently provided one of the most sought-after market access opportunities for creative entrepreneurs – we are proud to be partnering with them to accelerate the development of local creative entrepreneurs,” adds Stewart. “We are also thankful to Business and Arts South Africa (BASA), for their additional support of this programme, particularly in helping us create awareness of the Design lab and the fabulous designers we are working with.” The Watershed is a perfect threshing floor for new local talent. Renowned as a top Cape Town design destination, it boasts more than 150 stores selling 365 brands, including art, ceramics, textiles, furniture, fashion, jewellery and more. Alex Kabalin, Executive Manager: Retail at the V&A Waterfront, says that: “The Design Lab programme allows us to extend the opportunity for emerging retailers to test their product in a real world environment. Through this, it builds a new range of talented entrepreneurs accessing market at The V&A Waterfront.” Prospective applicants must be CDI members (membership is free). Designers will be able to submit their applications online via the CDI website until 13 May 2022. Only Cape Town-based businesses are eligible to apply at this time. For more information visit www.thecdi.org.za or www.waterfront.co.za. Also watch: Picture: Unsplash
Monday, 04 July 31 Jan One of Cape Town’s most prestigious social events, The WBS Cape Town Met, which is presented by World Sports Betting, returned in style this past weekend. In attendance were race-lovers, celebrities and influencers who all put their best fashion foot forward with their looks that followed this year’s Glam Garden theme. This year’s best-dressed winners were Trish Vermeulen – who wore a floral dress made by South African designer Priscilla Michelle and matched it with a headpiece from Pretoria-based SA School of Hat Making, and brand strategist and entrepreneur, Brandon Reynolds – who wore a flamboyant floral suit.
Keeping the crowd entertained throughout the day were Zakes Bantwini, Good Luck, Dean Fuel and Desiree.
In a statement, Donovon Everitt, head of commercial, events and marketing at Cape Racing, said the team is thrilled with the success of the 2022 Cape Town MET. “A lot of work has gone into ensuring that we could welcome back the public and bring back the Cape Town MET as we all know and love it. We are looking forward to building on this success in the coming year,” he said. Let’s take a look inside the event.
Building work is quiet, for now, on £200m project that pits different visions of South Africa’s future against one another Smoke curls into the air, a drum beats, the dance begins, a chant is raised. Ten metres away, cars howl past on a busy road, drivers unaware of the sacred ritual taking place in the centre of a bustling South African city. Francisco Mackenzie, a chief of the Cochoqua community of the Khoi people, talks of ancient beliefs and battles five centuries ago, against invaders from overseas. He points to the iconic skyline of Table Mountain, and then to a nearby building site. “This is where we come to venerate our ancestors and the great spirit creator and to renew our nation’s ties. That is where the first battle of resistance took place. But money is always disrespectful of nature, traditions and culture,” he told the Guardian. The money in question are the potential profits to be made from a 15-hectare (37-acre) site in Cape Town’s Observatory neighbourhood that is being turned into a complex that will house homes, shops, a hotel, conference centre and businesses. By far the most important tenant at the £200m project will be Amazon, which hopes to base its expanding operations in Africa there. For now cranes and bulldozers are still. Earlier this month, a court in Cape Town upheld a judgment in March which stopped work on the sprawling complex until further consultations had taken place with heritage groups representing some Indigenous communities. “It is another vindication,” said Tauriq Jenkins, an activist and member of the Goringhaicona Khoena council, as he watched the ceremony begin. “It will [help] dispel the lies and disinformation that have been generated against our claims. It’s a victory for the Sān and Khoi, our heritage and environment and for restorative justice.” But the story of the development is less clear than it might look, pitting different visions of South Africa’s future against one another and causing a bitter row within the communities of the Khoi and the Sān peoples, who were the earliest inhabitants of the country. Those opposed to the project say the site is a place of worship for both the Sān, who roamed as hunter-gatherers for tens of thousands of years, and the Khoi, who joined them as pastoralists more than 2,000 years ago. Both were forced off the land by invading Dutch with huge numbers dying of starvation, disease or enslaved. Campaigners say the construction site is at the confluence of two sacred rivers and on land seized by the Dutch East India Company, a powerful trading company run by wealthy merchants in the Netherlands and often seen as the first modern multinational, in 1657. They make the obvious comparison to the present day. “Back then they was the largest corporate entity on the planet, and they came and took this land … History is repeating itself,” Jenkins said. Others, however, including several established Khoi and Sān community organisations, do not see rapacious corporate raiders but a chance to attract much-needed foreign investment to South Africa and to focus attention on the grievances of a historically marginalised minority in the country. A coalition of Indigenous groups calling itself the Western Cape First Nations Collective has backed the project and engaged with the developers who have promised to include a “world class” heritage centre in the development, staffed and run by educators from the Khoi and Sān, which will celebrate their culture. Zenzele Khoisan, the chairman of the collective, said the project offered “hope and future” to marginalised communities and dismissed critics as “johnny-come-latelies”. “The confluence of the rivers and the battlefield are not where the development is being built. We have got something now that the South African government has never given us … This will be the launchpad for new and more intense battles,” Khoisan said. He dismissed the claim that it would destroy important sites as “poppycock”. South Africa’s flagging economy has been battered by Covid, corruption, power shortages and the failure of the ruling African National Congress to push through reforms. Unemployment reached a record 35.3% last year, and almost two-thirds of young people lack jobs. Local authorities backed the development, arguing that it would regenerate a swath of Cape Town. The site area was previously home to a golf driving range and bar, built over an infill site for industrial and railway refuse, next to the confluence of the two now heavily polluted, canalised rivers. James Tannenberger, a spokesperson for the developers, said the recent court judgment would deprive the broader community around the site of “significant socio-economic and environmental benefits” such as subsidised housing, upgrades to roads, parks and gardens as well as up to 19,000 jobs. Land, its history and its ownership are fraught issues in South Africa, where memories of forced removals and segregation remain fresh nearly three decades after the end of apartheid. Ciraj Rassool, a history professor at the University of Western Cape, said South Africa’s existing protection of sites was flawed as it framed heritage as something to be opposed to development. “The current legislation can’t really deal with an argument about history. There is a bias towards architecture and artefacts but here you have the meaning of a landscape,” Rassool said. Judge Patricia Goliath said her ruling should not be understood as a criticism of the development but that the core issue was there needed to be proper consultation before it could go ahead. Amazon representatives in the UK and the US declined to comment. The company already employs thousands of people in data hubs in Cape Town. Jenkins and other campaigners are acutely aware that any victory could be temporary. “We’ve stopped this thing for now, but only for now,” he said.
Note: Search is limited to the most recent 250 articles. To access earlier articles, click Advanced Search and set an earlier date range. To search for a term containing the ‘&’ symbol, click Advanced Search and use the ‘search headings’ and/or ‘in first paragraph’ options. Sponsored by Please enter the email address that you used to subscribe on Engineering News. Your password will be sent to this address. Sponsored by separate emails by commas, maximum limit of 4 addresses Sponsored by New architectural curator to guide Build section at Decorex Africa’s reimagined Cape Town and Joburg shows 28th April 2022 ARTICLE ENQUIRYSAVE THIS ARTICLEEMAIL THIS ARTICLE Font size: –+ / MEDIA STATEMENT /This content is not written by Creamer Media, but is a supplied media statement. To help catapult Decorex Africa into its brightly reimagined future, a new architectural curator has been appointed to aid in steering the Cape Town and Joburg shows in the jaw-dropping, industry-changing direction the organisers, RX Africa, have envisaged. Respected local architect Theo Bothma is on board to set the tone and vet exhibitors to ensure the best of the best – best in class and best practice. He joins fellow Decorex Africa curator, the trailblazing creative director, Bielle Bellingham, who is also newly appointed to helm the show’s content. An active architect and interior designer, Bothma established Theo Bothma Architects and Design (TBAD) in 2017, and continues there as both founder and the firm’s director, bringing over 10 years of industry experience to his role. He has captured the idea of luxury design on both a national and international scale. His experience has helped create a design service that emphasises client consideration as each design is personalised and unique. He believes that design should be bespoke and allow people to experience personalised luxury. TBAD is based in Johannesburg and has worked on several commissions, including substantial private homes in South Africa and Africa, Namily Zimbabwe, Zambia and Nigeria. Two of Theo’s favourite personal projects include Villa Meyersdal and Villa Morningside. For Villa Meyersdal, the design of this contemporary family home in Johannesburg takes advantage of the temperate climate to allow a seamless flow between spacious living spaces and beautiful landscaping on the exterior. With framed views of the Johannesburg skyline and abundant natural light, this home encourages a sense of welcome relaxation for the family. In Villa Morningside, interior design meets art. This project was a combination of interior design, lifestyle creation and art. TBAD complemented the bold and bright artworks by using neutral textures and materials. The artworks were further enhanced by the use of lighting design, where both natural and artificial lighting were incorporated. What this extensive hands-on experience means for Decorex Africa, its exhibitors and trade guests, is that Theo intimately understands the industry and what it needs. Both now and in the future. “The future of the built environment is driven by collaboration. The connection between the built environment and technology will see an increase in more self-sufficient and sustainable designs. The influence of automated and digital architecture and design will change the way in which design is experienced,” he says. With regard to his role as Decorex Africa curator and his plans to reimagine the Build section, Bothma believes that “by carefully selecting different and original participants for Decorex 2022, we can open up the view of the building sector. By having a wide range of participants from various sectors, we are encouraging collaboration. By highlighting the importance of collaboration, we will enhance the value of all sectors within the industry, allowing design to flourish.” Indeed, being part of Decorex 2022 as a curator has already allowed Bothma to both influence and learn more about design in his personal capacity. “Design is large, and we can all learn a great deal from each other,” he states humbly. You too can learn more about the building industry’s latest and greatest, and who to collaborate with, at the upcoming Decorex Africa shows, taking place at the CTICC from 16-19 June 2022 and at the Sandton Convention Centre from 28-31 July 2022. Edited by: Creamer Media Reporter
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