A Spaniard in the Works

Tag: Cape Town Partnership

  • Tale of two annual reports, two divergent corporate cultures

    One is an organisation I admire greatly.  The other is one I used to admire.  And it all came into focus when I just happened to read both their annual reports in one week. Wesgro’s annual report is a monster and reminded me of City of Cape Town reports prior to 1976, when departments tried […]

  • “This deserves our best shot”

    The first Joint Marketing Initiative (JMI) started 10 years ago when there was a brief DA-led political alignment between the Province and the City.  It lost its way and was watered down during the ANC’s period of tenure — Wesgr0 (the trade promotion agency) was just one of the agencies that pulled out and all…

  • Cape Town: World Design Capital 2014

    Cape Town was named as the Word Design Capital for 2014 ahead of the other short-listed cities, Dublin and Bilbao.  This prestigious status is designated biennially by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID) to cities that are dedicated to using design for social, cultural and economic development.  Cape Town’s accolade was awarded…

  • Why Cape Town is surfing the crest of a wave

    In 1990, while I was part of the V&A Waterfront team, I bought an international travel magazine. There was a story on Barcelona’s renaissance after the end of Spain’s dictatorship. With events then starting to unfold in South Africa, I wondered if the same could happen in Cape Town. Although there have been scores of…

  • SA Destination Awards – How it all began

    I’ve spent two years exploring South Africa and have never ceased to be amazed at the enormous disparity between towns as “Destinations.” Take tiny De Rust near Meiringspoort in the Western Cape as an example. It has far greater attraction than Mokopane — 200 times larger — on the edge of the Waterberg in Limpopo.…