The Earthly Touch Foundation and the Rotary Club of Morningside host a night for tomorrow’s builders
From recycled plastic walls to solar energy and spekboom gifts, the Woodmead gala drove support for the Eco Education Centre in Diepsloot, a sustainable, self-sufficient education centre pointing the way towards the future.
Green took centre stage recently at the Country Club Johannesburg in Woodmead.
The Earthly Touch Foundation and the Rotary Club of Morningside held a green and gold fundraising gala, rooted in community, sustainability, and real-world impact.
Working under the banner: Saving tomorrow today, the night focused on how recycled plastic can be turned into eco-bricks, how communities can save water more deliberately, and how education remains the strongest tool for long-term change.
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At the heart of the campaign is the Eco Education Centre in Diepsloot, a project designed to provide children, students, unemployed youth, and women with a place to learn skills that can actually transform their futures.
The Eco Education Centre itself is an ambitious build. It’s constructed from eco-bricks made of 110t of recycled plastic, runs on solar power, and includes six waterless toilets, donated by Rotary. A rainwater harvesting system keeps the building’s footprint low, while it serves 100 early childhood development learners, 100 students needing extra lessons, and 100 unemployed youth and women, gaining vocational training.
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Rotary Club of Morningside president Simon Chakumbu opened the evening with a reminder that both organisations share the same mission: To create opportunities for young people and women, while protecting the environment they inherit. There was a moment of reflection and gratitude from Anthea Thyssen-Ambursley, of Yes, We Can Business Network, who acknowledged the women who donated on the night, helping carry the project forward, and a panel of green champions rounded off the programme.
Zambian ecopreneur Simbarashe Dube Siziba, from The Waste and the People, showed how discarded plastic and tyres can become functional furniture, Collen Ekman, from Cherith Projects, unpacked why alternative fire-resistant building methods matter in dense communities, and Earthly Touch’s Diana Musara, also a Rotarian, laid out the long-term vision for the Eco-Bricks Project, before gifting each guest a spekboom plant, a small but symbolic carbon-absorbing companion.
By the end of the night, R250 000 had been raised through donations and a spirited auction.
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