Who we are

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Who or what is Altemit?

It was chosen simply as a word-play. Both the Afrikaans word "altemit" and the similar-sounding English word "ultimate" lead us to a principle or driving goal of our business: We are driven to deliver workmanship of the highest quality to satisfy the need of our customers.

A literal translation would be: Perhaps, maybe. It refers to a well-known Afrikaans phrase: "Dis nie altemit nie!", which could be translated best as "There’s no doubt about it" or "it’s a sure thing” or "there are no two ways about it".

So when Altemit promises you value for money, then we mean to do just that, and there is no doubt about it. That is the ultimate goal or principle of Altemit.

Who is Daniël Vrey?

I was born in 1982 in Upington (South Africa) but received all my school education in Pretoria. I spent a year working in the USA and learned to be independent. My father, and his father before him, loved to work with wood and inspired me to do the same.

My father had a workshop equipped with a range of woodworking machinery, especially an excellent woodturning lathe which was his pride and joy. Looking at him and learning from him – that is how and where it started. My parents moved down to the Cape in 2004 and I followed a few months later and began work at the same company as my father, installing all types of built-in cupboards and a variety of wooden products.

In 2009 I took the step to venture out on my own. I admit that it is a risk in this global economic situation, but I believe in myself and in my capabilities. I am positive that I will be well placed when the economy turns.

I am married to Yolandi Steynberg of Pretoria and we live in the Strand.

A proud heritage

While doing genealogical research, my father recently discovered that our love and appreciation for wood and well-made wooden products actually goes further back in history.

The two wall cupboards, built by Bernardus Vrey, in the Drostdy Museum in Swellendam

The ancestor of the Vrey’s was Bernardus Vrey who arrived here in 1750 from Germany. He was initially employed in Malmesbury as a carpenter, a “huis-timmerman” before becoming a free-burgher and moving to Swellendam. In the Drostdy Museum in Swellendam, in a replica of the complete farmhouse of the farm Zanddrift, is a pair of delightful wall-cupboards built into the wall of the “voorhuis” (and I mean literally built into the wall).

A close-up of the cupboards

In their book "A Guide to the Old Buildings of the Cape", the authors Hans Fransen and Mary Alexander Cook writes: "It seems likely that a certain Bernardus Vrey... helped in the building of Zanddrift. The two wall-cupboards can hardly described to anyone else, and the doors too, unusually fine for this outlying area, should be his work".

I am proud to be a descendant of Bernardus.

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