Springtime is serious business in the Mother City.
Not only does it herald the arrival of summer, but it’s also the time when our factory queens get ready for the biggest beauty pageant in the Mother city, the Spring Queen.
And the ladies at Kazak Designs are willing to try any kind of Mickey Mouse tricks to raise funds to get their girl to this year’s SACTWU Spring Queen pageant.
The five factories in Observatory are hosting fundraisers every Friday and last week it was a Minnie Mouse affair.
All the ladies had on their best Minnie ears and had loads of fun and laughs raising money for their as yet uncrowned queen.
Former Spring Queen June Hendricks, who won the crown in 1982 and works at Kazak Designs, says they need to raise funds because being a beauty queen isn’t cheap - she will need a kwaai outfit, make-up, hair, shoes and alles.
“We are raising funds every week, the ladies pay R5 (to dress up) and every Friday we have a different theme. The Minnie Mouse theme was loads of fun,” she says.
The Kazak factory floor was a burst of colour as everyone came out to support the cause.
Next week they are bringing it back home, where African prints will be the order of the day.
“On Friday our theme is Africa, we also sell boerewors rolls and anything else to raise funds,” adds June.
Later that night, they will be going to Club Galaxy where the Kazak queen will be crowned.
There are 17 finalists who will be strutting their stuff, and the winner will be Kazak Design’s 2016 entrant to the Spring Queen pageant, taking place later this year.
This is only the second year that the gala event will not be held at the Good Hope Centre.
Last year, on the pageant’s iconic 40th anniversary, thousands of factory workers and their families attended the event at their new venue at the Athlone Stadium.
This after the City of Cape Town rented the centre out to a filmmaking company.
Zubeida Beyers, 28, from Bonteheuwel, who works at Top Stitch, walked off with the 2015 crown.