The year of the elephant

These turned out to be the bones of a straight-tusked elephant (palaeoloxodon antiquus) that lived about 120,000 years ago during the Late Pleistocene era, more popularly known as the Last Ice Age. The Warsaw authorities later decided to commemorate the discovery of the oldest specimen of an animal ever in the soil of the city by installing a plaque at the station’s entrance emblazoned with an image of the antediluvian creature, together with replicas of some of the bones displayed in an illuminated case set into the floor. The installation is not very big, but actually looks quite good. However, since such elephants grew to five metres in height and had a weight of up to seven tonnes, many local people have become a bit obsessed by the find and have let their imaginations run a bit wild. Almost every day you can see hordes of pre- and infant school children who have been dragged to Płocka station by their teachers to gaze upon the remains of the prehistoric giant. Unfortunately, some of these teachers are rather too creative in their descriptions, hailing the beast as “the dinosaur of Płocka”; and so we often see the youngest fans of Manny and Sid of the animated movie ‘Ice Age’ excitedly glancing around the underground passageway for anything that might resemble a dinosaur (or at least its skeleton) on a scale of one-to-one. And so, it comes as a huge let-down to them when they discover that the “dinosaur” in question turns out to be these shapeless grey objects under their feet, which they can’t imagine had anything to do with any kind of animal, never mind one the size of an average house in Konstancin.

The reason why I’m telling you all this in the year’s first edition of ‘Eurobuild’ is that I thought the story would be a nice segue into our traditional New Year’s greetings, as I would like to wish that someone will always be there to conjure fantastic visions before your eyes throughout 2024 (such as spectacular business opportunities) – and that these will indeed be worth your while and not turn out to be a disappointment. May you be as creative as those young school children and hold onto these visions into the new year – and may they be as steadfast as palaeoloxodon antiquus, but perhaps more dynamic than what’s left of its skeleton.

You certainly won’t be left disappointed by the content in this mid-winter edition of ‘Eurobuild’. At first glance, you should be able to see that we have put a lot of work into the topic of ESG. On these pages you can find an analysis of green leases, learn how to involve contractors in implementing ESG principles, and also find out how warehouses have been catching up with offices in terms of green certification. Moreover, we would like to show you the importance of silence in the office and also convince you of how important it is to talk to tenants at every stage of the leasing process. In addition to all that, we will also be taking a look back at the 29th Eurobuild Annual Commercial Real Estate Conference.

And so, dear readers, together we can once again boldly launch ourselves into the new year!