When you think of male-dominated fields, construction probably comes to mind. But here in Philadelphia, women are breaking ground in more ways than one.
Emily Bittenbender worked for the Rendell Administration, completing $454 million in capital projects in 3 and 1/2 years.
She then led the design and construction of the National Constitution Center. Now, she owns and operates her own construction company.
"Our tagline is: 'Changing the way you think about construction'," said Bittenbender.
Bittenbender Construction is changing the face of construction from the inside out.
Twenty years ago, she became the first female founded and owned union commercial general contractor.
"We have six executives at Bittenbender Construction. Five of the six are women," she said.
Early on, Bittenbender brought in a female partner, Angela Vacante.
"We build buildings and we build people," she said.
Nearly half of the company's employees are women.
"Our culture is very different," she said. "We understand that the first priority really is the family and the children and we provide flexible hours."
In 2015, Bittenbender broke another barrier when she became the chair of the General Building Contractors Association .
"I'm the first female chairman of the board in 300 years," she said.
Her handprint is everywhere in Philadelphia.
"My company really likes to do projects that have impact in our community and our citizens. One prime example, we're really proud of Sister Cities Park ," said Bittenbender.
Other projects include Comcast, PECO Exelon, Verizon, Princeton University and Penn.
And Bittenbender makes it a priority to work with other women in construction, like Peggy Kelly, the principal of Falkbuilt Philadelphia.
"We are a woman-owned, minority-owned business enterprise as well," said Kelly.
Using technology that marries the best of pre-fab and general construction, Falkbuilt builds interior walls.
"It can look like wood, it can look like paint," she said.
She takes care of everything from design and development to manufacturing and installation.
"We do it in a unique and different way. We do it in a sustainable way. We do it in a faster way. We do it in a way that really offers options to the design community," she said.
It's a replacement for drywall.
"We're digitizing the components and making them off site, but they're already sized and ready to order," she said. "So that you have walls that are going up about 30% faster than you would with just general construction."
The product is flexible so you can essentially bend the product to fit instead of knocking down walls. And you can re-use it, which means minimal waste, less material and zero dust.
Kelly calls it a clean build and says consider that 80% of landfills are construction product.
"We're not taking anything to the landfills," she said.
Plus she said Falkbuilt reduces freight and associated emissions by as much as 75%.
"We're building for a better tomorrow," she said.
One wall and one woman at a time.
Kelly and Bittenbender Construction have worked together on a number of jobs. This is Kelly's third company. She actually started in the beauty business, working for the Estee Lauder brand and moving from creating beautiful faces to beautiful spaces.
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