Category: Networking events

New suppliers, new venues as The Westminster Collection prepares for its 2015 events programme

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The Westminster Collection (TWC), London’s venue marketing consortium, is delighted to welcome a selection of new venues and suppliers to membership.

Accomplished event photographer Karolina Krasuska specialises in music, event and editorial photography and has over 10 years’ experience in the field, with established long-term relationships with clients that include Toni & Guy, Pernod Ricard UK and IFC. Renowned for her contemporary, edgy style and ability to capture the energy of an event, she has covered London Fashion Week for seven years and she also worked with TWC at its Destination Westminster venue showcase in October 2014, which was held at BAFTA 195 Piccadilly.

Mobile bar specialist The Bar Bazaar provides high quality event bars, reception desks, food service stations and all manner of stylish event bar solutions to venues and clients including The Brit Awards, the V&A and Jimmy Choo. The bars are custom built offering bespoke finishes and layouts and they can be branded thanks to the company’s exceptional in-house production facilities.

The Event Hire Company provides exclusive furniture, kitchen equipment and accessories for hire to both the private and public sectors and has experience of a wide variety of events, including corporate hospitality, weddings, exhibitions and conferences. The team is expert in providing a wealth of knowledge and seamless pre- to post-event service to a client portfolio that includes Team GB, The City of London, John Lewis, BBC and ITV. The Event Hire Company was also a supplier to Destination Westminster at BAFTA and enjoys established relationships with a number of venues within TWC membership.

New to the collection’s portfolio of venues is St James Theatre, the first newly-built theatre complex in Central London in 30 years. Located just around the corner from Buckingham Palace, it plays host to cabaret, comedy, music and theatre with current shows including the critically acclaimed Bad Jews.

The theatre is a perfect venue for product launches, private screenings and for more intimate creative workshops. It’s only a few minutes from Victoria station and boasts an intimate 312-seat theatre available for daytime events and a flexible 100-seat studio, a wonderful live entertainment space that lends itself to becoming a flexible and self-contained corporate events venue. The St. James Bar and Brasserie and the Carrara Restaurant offer a range of stylish, informal dining options.

Another recent re-joiner of TWC, after a break from membership, is the award-winning QEII Centre, newly refurbished as part of a £12 million rebranding and renovation project. The iconic venue, which sits opposite Westminster Abbey, is boldly re-establishing its wow factor within the global events industry, now offering a more modern and stylish environment for the 400+ national and international events that are hosted there each year. It provides the ideal central London location for high profile conferences, conventions, exhibitions and corporate events with impressive capacity for up to 2,500 delegates.

Karin Parkinson, TWC board director and Central Hall Westminster’s facilities and administration manager, said: “We wish a very warm welcome to our new venues and partners, who have already shown real eagerness and commitment to becoming active members of The Westminster Collection’s network of venues and suppliers. Through our energetic 2015 marketing communications programme, we look forward to assisting in bringing their services to the attention of prospective new clients.”

TWC will shortly look forward to the opportunity to promote its member venues to events professionals at International Confex in London on 18-19 February 2015. Sales and marketing representatives from more than 20 of its 41 venues will be present at TWC stand CF57 to meet and greet show visitors across the two days of the event, ready to talk event planners through the collection’s eclectic portfolio of central London venues.

TWC’s 2015 events programme includes International Confex (18-19 Feb), Embassy Event Expo and The Meetings Show (7-9 July) together with its own annual venue showcase (Sept 2015) and a newly-revamped series of venue familiarisation trips for buyers.

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The first TWC fam trip of the year takes place at St James Theatre on Weds 25th February, 08:30-10:30am. Any event planner wishing to attend this exclusive event can email [email protected] to request a place.

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Immerse yourself in contagious creativity at new London events space St James Theatre

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Come and explore the characterful St James Theatre, newly available to the London corporate and private events venue market, at an exclusive, private tour hosted by event manager Adam and his team. The coffee morning takes place on Wednesday 25 February at 8:30am. If you’d like to be there, please email [email protected] to request a place.

St James Theatre is the first newly-built theatre complex in Central London in 30 years. Located just around the corner from Buckingham Palace, it plays host to cabaret, comedy, music and theatre with current shows including the critically acclaimed Bad Jews.

The theatre is a perfect venue for product launches, private screenings and for more intimate creative workshops. It’s only a few minutes from Victoria station and boasts an intimate 312-seat theatre available for daytime events and a flexible 100-seat studio, a wonderful live entertainment space that lends itself to becoming a flexible and self-contained corporate events venue. The St. James Bar and Brasserie and the Carrara Restaurant offer a range of stylish, informal dining options.

Explore more here and to request a place on the private coffee morning tour, please email [email protected].

BAFTA draws crowd for annual Westminster venue showcase

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Friday 10th October saw more than 150 event buyers gather at BAFTA 195 Piccadilly to discover and network with dozens of central London’s best event venues, brought together over breakfast by London venue marketing consortium The Westminster Collection (TWC).

It was TWC’s annual venue showcase, Destination Westminster, held once a year to create an opportunity for people who organise events to enjoy productive, face-to-face conversations with venue representatives from some of London’s finest historic institutes and societies, dedicated conference venues, river boat venues, luxury hotels, museums, tourist attractions, private members clubs and concert halls.

Guests in attendance came from a mixture of integrated marketing agencies, event agencies, charities, embassies, government organisations, law firms, accountancy firms, retailers and tour operators.

BAFTA 195 Piccadilly took the opportunity to showcase its bright and airy David Lean Room and Foyer Bar, as guests posed for twitter and Instagram photos alongside iconic BAFTA masks and enjoyed indulgent, sweet and savoury breakfast treats including cinnamon toast with roast banana on a chocolate milk shot, and spinach, potato and goats cheese tortilla with smashed avocado.

Guests then loaded up their pick ‘n’ mix bags with breakfast themed treats from the sweetie bar before seizing the chance to make like the stars by taking their seats in BAFTA’s illustrious Princess Anne Theatre. Here they watched short screenings of candid interviews with Hollywood film stars including the late Robin Williams and Tom Hanks, as well as British talents Idris Elba and Ricky Gervais.

Speaking of the event, Allyson Hargreaves, board director for The Westminster Collection says, “We always look forward to this event. It provides great sales leads for our venues and we hope serves to raise awareness of the excellent, free venue finding and event enquiry tools The Westminster Collection offers to event planners via our website. There are few events that offer such an intimate opportunity to network and have meaningful business conversations in a relaxed environment.”

BAFTA to lift curtain on The Westminster Collection’s annual venue showcase

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Event planners and agents are encouraged to RSVP now to secure attendance at London’s finest event venue showcase, The Westminster Collection’s ‘Destination Westminster 2014′, this year being held at the iconic BAFTA 195 Piccadilly on Friday 10th October, 8:00 – 11:00am.

Famously the home of British moving image, BAFTA 195 Piccadilly is looking forward to opening its doors to event planners from all across London and beyond for a productive morning of networking, event planning and conversation with more than 40 of the city’s most celebrated venues, available for corporate or private hire.

Exclusively promoting venues within central London’s City of Westminster – which encompasses Pimlico in the south, to Regent’s Park in the north and from the borders of Kensington in the west, to Covent Garden in the east – guests of this enjoyable breakfast networking event can look forward to discovering private members clubs, modern and traditional conference centres, historic institutes and societies, prestigious academies, concert halls, galleries and museums, tourist attractions, luxury hotels, river boats and churches.

Anna Glazebrook, board director for The Westminster Collection and marketing manager at One Great George Street, says, “Every year we look forward to the opportunity to present a friendly one-stop-shop environment where buyers and venues come together to share information and explore the possibilities and opportunities available for events held within our vast collection of venues. The face-to-face contact is really important to building working relationships and so many of our guests always comment on how they’ve discovered venues or features and services they didn’t even know were available.

“We welcomed the QEII Centre (currently undergoing a £12m refurbishment) and The Royal Air Force Club into our collection this year. I’d encourage anyone in the business of planning events to come along and network with the expert event teams from these and our other leading venues, win prizes, unlock special discounts and incentives and enjoy a delicious, free breakfast.

Celebrating all that’s iconic about this famed events venue, showcase guests can also seize the opportunity to make like the stars and take their seats in BAFTA’s illustrious Princess Anne Theatre, which seats 227, where they can watch screenings of candid interviews with legendary Hollywood film stars including the late Robin Williams and Tom Hanks, as well as homegrown talents Idris Elba, Ricky Gervais, Karl Pilkington and Stephen Merchant amongst others.

 

Eventbrite - Destination Westminster 2014: London Venue Showcase

You’re invited! REGISTER NOW

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TWC showcase - register now

 

 

RSVP now to secure your attendance at London’s finest event venue showcase, The Westminster Collection’s ‘Destination Westminster 2014’, this year being held at the iconic BAFTA 195 Piccadilly. Famously the home of British film, BAFTA 195 Piccadilly is looking forward to opening its doors to event planners from all across London and beyond for a productive morning of networking, event planning and conversation with 43 of the city’s most celebrated venues, available for corporate or private hire.

Exclusively promoting venues within central London’s City of Westminster – which encompasses Pimlico in the south, to Regent’s Park in the north and from the borders of Kensington in the west, to Covent Garden in the east – guests of this enjoyable breakfast networking event can look forward to discovering luxury hotels, world-renowned conference centres, training facilities, historic institutes and societies, celebrated attractions, galleries, museums and private members clubs.

It’s free to attend. All you need to do is click here to register!

TWC showcase - register now

 

 

For updates follow @Venues_Wminster #DestinationWestminster

Claim your tasty ticket to our BAFTA showcase at stand G19 at The Meetings Show

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Event buyers wanting an easy route to finding exceptional, centrally located London venues can look forward to Friday 10th October, when we will lift the curtain on our annual venue showcase, Destination Westminster 2014, taking place at the celebrated home of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, BAFTA 195 Piccadilly, 8am – 11am. Event organisers can claim their tasty ticket to register by popping over to The Westminster Collection on stand G19 at The Meetings Show, 8th-10th July at Olympia, London, where all will be revealed.

The Destination Westminster 2014 breakfast showcase event at BAFTA, which is free to attend, is an opportunity for anyone in the business of booking corporate and private events, meetings and conferences to spend a morning with the sales and marketing teams at more than 45 of central London’s most iconic venues. We’re renowned for our eclectic portfolio of member venues, which encompass everything from historic institutes and societies, colleges, museums and private members clubs, to luxury hotels, concert halls, modern training venues, churches and Thames river boats.

All visitors to TWC stand G19 at The Meetings Show will also be in with a chance of winning one of a handful of luxury Westminster experiences, including an afternoon tea for four at The Rag – Army & Navy Club and a one-night stay for two, including breakfast and an exclusive dinner at Bistro, at St James’ Court, A Taj Hotel, London.

We still have a limited selection of diary appointments available for buyers wanting a more dedicated introduction to the Collection. Register now using invitation code EXIN14.

Eventbrite - Destination Westminster 2014: London Venue Showcase

The name’s Bond. Bond in Motion.

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By Susan Heaton-Wright, managing director at Viva Live Music

Recently I was fortunate enough to be invited to an event hosted by The Westminster Collection at the wonderful London Film Museum in Covent Garden. The museum was hosting an exhibition of James Bond film artefacts, well mainly cars! The space had a number of iconic cars from the James Bond series of films. We weren’t allowed to sit on the bonnets for photos but the way they were lit up meant that you could really appreciate the design of the cars. What made it even more exciting was that there were short clips of the cars in the films behind each exhibit, so you were able to have a visual reminder of where the car appears in each film.

A background sound loop of the main James Bond theme played throughout the museum, but it wasn’t too loud. It just provided the visitors with an audio reminder.

The gentlemen at the event were SO excited about the cars. A number of them had their own Matchbox models (yes really!) but to see the full sized cars was very exciting. The exhibition also had some smaller props, such as a James Bond watch and his British Passport. There was also a gift shop where James Bond gifts were available to purchase. I had to drag my husband away from this!

The space was great. The area is a blank canvas and the curator had used the space so effectively. The event included some great drinks and canapés by KAI Catering and these were served in a bar area, although the waiters could serve it thoughout the space.

So, as we are an entertainment company who provides theming, what would we do to enhance the event? Well, with the theming in the museum, you need to do little more! However, the waiters could be dressed in formal wear and there could be “meet and greet” Bond Girls, Villains (Jaws is always good) and a James Bond. Everyone has a phone now, so to have photo opportunities is always great! If you wanted a featured entertainment spot, you could have a Bond Girl singing a couple of Bond themes or a 5-minute Octopussy Dance with Bond Girls. In my opinion, I would have a short featured entertainment spot as the venue does a lot of the work!

BAFTA to host collection’s 2014 venue showcase

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We’re delighted to announce that The Westminster Collection’s 2014 venue showcase will this year take place at the celebrated home of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, BAFTA 195 Piccadilly, in the David Lean Room which overlooks St James’s Church Garden. The date for your diary is Friday 10th October, 8:00am-11:00am.

Eventbrite - Destination Westminster 2014: London Venue Showcase

The breakfast showcase event, which is free to attend, is an opportunity for anyone in the business of booking corporate and private events, meetings and conferences to spend a morning with the sales and marketing teams at more than 45 of central London’s most iconic venues. The Westminster Collection is renowned for its eclectic portfolio of member venues, which encompass everything from historic institutes and societies, colleges, museums and private members clubs, to luxury hotels, concert halls, modern training venues, churches and Thames river boats.

To register your attendance and for all updates about the showcase programme, special showcase incentives and competitions, please click the link below.

Eventbrite - Destination Westminster 2014: London Venue Showcase

Event spend on the up as UK emerges from recession

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The Chancellor of the Exchequer confirmed in his recent budget that the UK is gradually emerging from the recession, forecasting a 2.7% increase in growth for 2014. Although still a long way from full economic recovery, this positive indication is as much an encouragement for the London events market as it is for UK business as a whole.

As more and more cash flow frees up, companies are once again looking at their budgets and to meetings and events as good marketing and networking tools for their businesses.

As economic pace has started to gather momentum, so too it seems has a renewed willingness to invest more money in events through enhancements and add-ons, offering delegates a more rounded experience than ‘the basic package’, which became a trend through the lowest points of the recession, as companies looked to make savings.

This begs the question: Has there been an increase on event spend as the UK emerges from the recession?

We asked some of The Westminster Collection’s member venues for their views, focusing on activity in January – March 2014 compared with the same period last year. We also asked where they think event organisers are directing the extra spend:

Robin Parker, general manager at Church House Conference Centre, feels that there has been an upturn in spend on events:

“We can report a 20% increase in catering spend compared with the same period last year. Although the spend in the public sector remains flat, reflecting a large number of budget freezes across government departments, the private sector is definitely spending more on adding value to their events through post-event receptions or by upgrading their lunch from basic sandwiches to a hot fork buffet.”

Guy Booth, venue manager at etc. venues Victoria, agreed, highlighting the benefits of adding a networking reception to meetings and conferences:

“We can confirm an upturn in added-value events at etc. venues Victoria in comparison to this time last year. As the recession lifts, more and more organisers are increasing their average spend to add a networking reception to finish their event. It is a clear sign that companies are appreciating the important business development opportunities that these extra touches offer whilst adding a fuller experience for delegates. Two out of three of all large meetings and conferences at etc. venues Victoria now incorporate a reception at the end of the day, encouraging relaxation in the courtyard garden.”

Tom Walsh, director of sales MICE at St Ermin’s Hotel, was more cautious in his response but felt that organisers were more receptive to upscaling their events:

“We are finding that budgets for events have become less restrictive than in years gone by. Certainly blank cheques are not being issued but neither an increase in F&B spend, nor package enhancements are being shunned as we had previously seen.”

Has your venue seen an increase or decrease in spend on events in the first quarter of 2014? If you have a view on this issue we would love to hear from you. If so, please email your response to [email protected].

Avoiding WiFi woes – Central Hall webinar announced

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Central Hall Westminster invites events professionals to register to participate in a free webinar it will host on Thursday 20th February, 9am-10am, to address the way and means to ‘Avoiding WiFi woes – filling the expectation gap between venues and event organisers’.

Staying ahead of the game is about proactively engaging with technology, sharing ideas and adapting to resources available. The UK events industry has a lot of catching up to do and through its ‘Meet the Future’ series, Central Hall is aiming to fill and bridge that gap.

Learn from the experts, including Richard Hughes, director of event WiFi specialist Max WiFi, and Kim Carrington, IT manager at Central Hall, who will help you to ask venues the right questions to avoid those familiar WiFi woes.

The session will prepare you with a solid understanding, case studies, a handy glossary and a unique chance to ask your specific event questions. To register for this free event click here.

Send your questions prior to the event to Maria Schuett to guarantee inclusion in the seminar programme.