RICHARD KOLOMY

I started an apprenticeship in bridge building and worked for a civil engineering company and we built bridges out West of Sydney as well as in the city. I found it very interesting work, and a family friend approached me and asked whether I'd be interested in working on high-rise buildings in Sydney based on my skill background building bridges... I ended up on a large construction project in Sydney. In particular, I was working on the lift cores, which are generally, roughly two floors above the main structure. So you rise at the highest end of the building at any one time. As a young lad, that was quite exciting and quite a hazardous job, which made it a bit more interesting. It was a great introduction to the industry and how complex it was and I was extremely interested in how the process was managed and how you could pool so many people together to put these amazing structures up.

Primary location: Valentine