Cape Town - Through its new Save Our Beach Huts campaign, the Beach Hut Trust is drawing attention to the decay of Cape Town’s iconic beach huts in Muizenberg and St James.
The campaign aims to raise funds and awareness for the restoration and maintenance of the beach huts through a telethon this month.
The telethon will be held on Saturday, September 25 at Blue Route Mall from 9am until 2pm with local sponsors and celebrities manning the phone lines to raise awareness and celebrate the unique heritage of the huts in Cape Town.
Save Our Beach Huts founding member Angela Gorman said that after seeing the state of the beach huts last year and hearing that the City Council had no plans to restore or renovate them, they started the community campaign Save Our Beach Huts on Facebook.
The group were able to restore their first hut last year with assistance from building contractors, roofers and painters that donated their services. Their ultimate goal is to restore all the beach huts on both Muizenberg and St James beaches.
Gorman said the restoration plan would also create employment opportunities for the local community in the form of maintenance, cleaning and security crews.
“The telethon is predominantly an awareness campaign to hopefully make companies aware that they can get behind this community project by offering to sponsor a hut. Raising awareness on Heritage Day is the best way to show that the public can make a difference by saving our historic and iconic beach huts,” said Gorman.
Good Hope FM’s Breakfast Show sports presenter and comedian Dalin Oliver will be supporting the telethon and appealed to the public to donate towards the restoration campaign.
“This is a community initiative to raise funds, preserve, protect and promote the Muizenberg huts – one of the most iconic things in Cape Town,” said professional comedian Carl Weber, who will also be supporting the campaign.
Anyone interested in getting involved with the telethon or donating towards the cause was encouraged to visit the campaign’s website https://beachhuts.org.za/donate-now/ or by scanning the QR codes on the celebrity pictures on the campaign’s Facebook and Instagram pages.