Vukile’s Castellana Properties wins three major awards from the Spanish Shopping Centre Association

Vukile Property Fund (JSE: VKE), the specialist retail REIT invested in South Africa and Spain, has congratulated its Madrid-listed subsidiary, Castellana Properties, for winning two awards and one honourable mention at the closing ceremony of the Spanish Shopping Centre Association’s (AECC) XVIII Conference, held in Seville, Spain, earlier this month and attended by more than one thousand professionals.

Specialist retail property firm Castellana Properties was named winner of three categories. It won the “Award for best CSR Initiative” in recognition of its “No lo sigas” campaign, aimed at tackling bullying at school and online. The main objective of this initiative – which was rolled out across every single shopping centre in the company’s portfolio – was to raise people’s awareness around the issue of school bullying.

The second accolade presented to Castellana Properties was the “Award for best small-scale refurbishment”, for its upgrade of the Los Arcos shopping centre. Castellana Properties invested EUR6.3 million in improving and extending the retail and leisure offering of the popular shopping centre in Seville. In total the project transformed more than 11,000sqm and welcomed leading retailers such as Mercadona, Media Markt, Lefties, Espacio Casa and Juguettos along with many others.

The third recognition came in the form of an “Honourable mention for the best full-scale redesign” for the complete revamp carried out at Bahía Sur in Cádiz. Since it first acquired the El Corte Inglés at Bahía Sur in 2019, Castellana Properties has injected a total of over EUR17 million in redesigning and upgrading the shopping centre, which has attracted a host of leading brands to the province, such as Yelmo Cines Premium, Lefties, Primark, Álvaro Moreno, and JD Sport among others.

Laurence Rapp, CEO of Vukile Property Fund, comments, “These prestigious awards are a great honour. We are incredibly proud of the Castellana team and applaud their tireless passion, innovation, and dedication to enhance value for their customers, communities, retailers, investors and all stakeholders. We couldn’t be more pleased that their very deserving achievements have been recognised by their esteemed peers in the Spanish retail property market.”

Vukile is a focused retail REIT with 46% of its assets in South Africa and 54% in Spain through its 89.6% held Madrid-listed subsidiary Castellana Properties Socimi.