Tag: Technology

The Ri launches new venue hire website

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The Royal Institution of Great Britain (Ri) is pleased to unveil its new-look website, which has undergone a virtual make-over designed to showcase the stunning and historic architecture of its Grade I listed building, near New Bond Street, London.

Built with the event planner in mind, the Ri’s new website has been made fully accessible, so it can be navigated with ease by event type or by room. It also offers a large choice of event packages, room specifications and event menus, which can be browsed at leisure.

Taking full advantage of the wonderful photography from past events, the new website offers visitors a unique virtual tour of the Royal Institution’s many diverse event spaces. Emma Hill, events and conference sales manager, said, “This new site underpins a wider digital strategy for engaging new clients. We recognised a need for an image led site to allow event planners and potential clients to fully understand the spaces we have available to hire. After all, we are delighted that the revenue from the venue hire business supports the charitable work the Royal Institution does in science education and communication.”

For more information on events at the Ri please contact the venue and events team on [email protected] or call 020 7409 2992. Visit the new website at www.venue.rigb.org.

Church House recruits young AV talent

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Church House Conference Centre has welcomed two new graduates to its award winning in-house AV team. They join in the roles of as Junior AV Technicians.

Tom Young studied Audio Music Production at Buckinghamshire New University and worked as a playback sound engineer at Lord’s Cricket Ground for the London 2012 Olympic archery events. He also worked as a sound engineer at a variety of music venues.

Andrew Hitchcock, who graduated from the University of Derby last year, worked as an assistant technician at Theatre Severn in Shrewsbury, as well as working at Carnegie Hall in Dunfermline with the Young Theatre Group and with various recording studios across London.

“We are delighted to welcome Tom and Andrew to our team,” said Ian Locke, AV Manager. “At Church House we recognise the difficulties many graduates face in gaining their first steps in the working world. Tom and Andrew have great enthusiasm for AV and the events industry as well as an abundance of raw talent. Young people are the future of the events industry and it’s therefore essential that we pass on our expertise and knowledge to them, helping them kick-start their careers and encouraging their development.”

Church House Conference Centre continually invests in its in-house AV team and technology. Recent investments include web streaming services, a 100Mbps broadband line and digital signage.  The team was recently awarded AV Magazine’s In-house AV Team of the Year Award 2012.

 

Christmas party venues: VIP gigs and the edible Sugar Palace

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8 Northumberland Avenue is pushing the boat out this year with two creative themes that will see you clock-watching until the silly season. This Christmas, The Old Billiard Room will transform into an enchanting fairy-tale playground. Think ‘Sugar Plum Fairy’s Kingdom of Sweets meets the White Witch’s Castle’.

A glittering silver and white colour scheme perfects a dazzling winter wonderland complete with edible trees, giant lollipops and a candy-man DJ. Nibble on whimsical spinning table centres and enter the dungeon sweet shop if you dare. But beware, The White Witch will be casting a spell over the evening and once guests have entered The Sugar Palace, they may never want to leave.

Alternatively, invite your guests to ‘Rock the Ballroom’ in a show-stopping, live gig extravaganza in the spectacular Victorian Ballroom, boasting soaring columns, dazzling arches and intricate ceilings dressed with vintage chandeliers. Guests will believe they’re watching top artists perform live on stage at their very own private gig thanks to ground-breaking 3D holographic technology developed by Musion – as famously seen during Coachella 2012, when Dr Dre and Snoop Dogg resurrected the late rapper Tupac Shakur as an on-stage hologram.

Package prices for both themes start at £70pp. Book early to avoid disappointment by calling 020 3263 1011 or emailing [email protected].

More Christmas party venue options:

Good, old-fashioned nostalgia: 1920s & 1940s

Your own private members club

Lights, camera, exhibition!

A classic Christmas knees-up

Christmas with a conscience

Roasted chestnuts, mulled wine and carols

Intimate, private dining celebrations

Work hard, play hard

 

Free technology breakfast briefing – 14th May, Prince Philip House

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Learn about social media campaigns, connectivity and RFID implementation designed to maximise the event and delegate experience in 2013 at a free breakfast briefing on 14th May at Prince Philip House.

Speakers include Andi Allen from Reflex Limited and Richard Hughes from Max WiFi, who’ll look at what organisers need to know about connectivity in the live environment, including digital signage.

Mike Fletcher, freelance multi-media writer and editor, will look at inspiring social media use within live environments and how to measure its success, while Richard Smith from Excelerated Apps will explain how to use RFID and NFC technology to put social media at the heart of your events.

Registration from 7.30am, briefing begins at 8am prompt. Breakfast and networking from 9.10am -10am. To reserve your free place, email Becci Thomson or click here for more information.

New TWC website launches to provide effective venue sourcing for events planners under pressure

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Robin Parker, marketing director for The Westminster Collection, talks us through the design decisions and brand new features of the venue collection’s new website, which launched officially this month.

Venue choice in London can be overwhelming as there are so many locations, building styles, budget options and varying degrees of quality to consider. We know from our clients that efficiency at the venue sourcing stage is absolutely critical, because that’s often the most time consuming part. You have an event theme, an intended date and a full marketing plan ready to get off the ground for your event, but until you find the right venue, very little of it can get underway.

Efficiency for the event planner was central to the rebuild of The Westminster Collection’s brand new website, which I’m pleased to launch this month.

Saying it quickly, saying it well and making it easy to enquire are important aspects of the new design of the site, which was built by Design Incorporated. Event planners were telling us they wanted a speedy foot in the door to some of London’s best and most centrally located venues, and that their initial decisions about which venues to book are driven by venue location, capacity and style.

Taking that feedback, we stripped down our original site and took it right back to basics. Location is a huge lure for The Westminster Collection but the boundaries of this borough are often misunderstood. The City of Westminster is home to some of the finest meetings, conference and events venues in the capital, and it accounts for a huge area of Zone 1 central London, encompassing major landmarks, world famous shopping streets, beautiful parks and an assortment of restaurants, attractions and entertainment.

It borders the London Borough of Camden to the east and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea to the west, incorporating districts including Bayswater, Belgravia, Hyde Park, Knightsbridge, Mayfair, Marylebone, Paddington, Pimlico, St James’s, St John’s Wood, Soho, Victoria and the famous West End.

With a responsive design that makes it compatible with mobile and tablet devices, venues can now be browsed and selected from an interactive, Google-based map, which emphasises the breadth of the City of Westminster and the wealth of venues available within it. Venues are pinned to the map and when clicked, give the user the option to view the full profile.

Explore and compare venues side by side

The site’s new venue shortlist facility now enables event planners to add one or more of their preferred Westminster venues to a shortlist, from which they can then compare venues side-by-side according to location, size, room specifications and accessibility. If they’re happy with their selection, they can click ‘enquire with selected venues’ to complete a brief form which will then distribute this single enquiry to all of these venues.

The site is very image-led, which is a way for us to showcase the unique attributes of every one of our venues. Through photography displayed on the venue profiles and with our dynamic, dashboard style homepage, we have developed the website as a full-screen experience to maximise the accessibility from the large array of devices that people use to browse the internet today. The website features a considerable number of interactive features that have been built using JavaScript, HTML5 and CSS3 to ensure that they are usable across as many devices and browsers as possible.

Integrated news and special offers

The special offers page of the site now syncs smartly with the individual venue profiles, so if you view a profile, you’ll see the venue’s most recent corresponding offer appear in the left hand toolbar. The news page is also much more user friendly, with an attractive layout and the ability to share individual articles across social media channels – a feature we now expect when we access content online. Readers can also comment on articles and perform a keyword search of the site’s blog content to find relevant posts.

The project team

A particularly rewarding part of the build process of the new website is that the project has been steered by a specially formed committee of representatives from venues within the collection, led by Craig Wallace, conference and events manager at 1 Wimpole Street, with support from Anna Glazebrook at One Great George Street, Clare Hodgkinson at Church House Conference Centre, Maria Schuett at Central Hall Westminster, Petra Bones at The Banqueting House and our marketing and communications agency Custard Communications.

What we have now is something we’re very proud of and feedback during our recent soft launch demonstration phase at Confex is proving valuable. Although we’re confident the website is a much stronger tool for events planners, we will not stop the site development here. We’ll continue to polish and refine features and site functionality and we look forward to the platform this now gives us to better communicate with the events community and those looking to do business in Westminster.

Any feedback and suggestions are welcomed. Please email [email protected].

No.11 Cavendish completes £250k refurb

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The refurbishment of 10 meeting rooms at No.11 Cavendish Square is now complete and event organisers are invited to enjoy the spruced up surroundings at this centrally located venue, near Oxford Circus.

New carpets, re-painted walls and new blinds complement a collection of contemporary photographs of iconic London scenes hung on the walls, including views of the Shard, the London Eye and St Paul’s Cathedral.

One wall in each of the meeting rooms is now magnetised, enabling delegates to attach free-standing magnetic flip charts as required. Low wattage lighting and energy saving LCD panels also now feature in each room.

The £250,000 refurbishment, which includes renovation of the Marlborough and the Maynard Theatre and their adjoining break-out rooms, sees AV upgraded to include state-of-the-art, 55-inch slimline LCD monitors with wall-mounted sound bars. These provide high quality, easy-to-adjust audio without the need for data projectors and screens. Clients connect directly to a floor box for user-friendly, slick presentations.

Popular room The Orangery now boasts multi-colour LED lighting throughout, which can be used to colour match a brand or create a theme. The lighting is controlled from an iPad or via a wall-mounted control panel.

For more information on No.11 Cavendish Square click here, or to discuss your next event, please email Lucy Johnson Brown or call 020 7307 2488.

In-house vs. externally supplied AV: what to choose?

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Ian Locke, audio visual manager at Church House Conference Centre, weighs up the pros and cons of external AV suppliers versus the professional teams already embedded in-house at event venues.

In the events industry today there are a wealth of production companies offering creative service expertise and the latest equipment and technology, but there are also many venues which offer high quality audio visual services coupled with the latest technology in-house, constantly updated to meet the changing needs of the events industry. So why do some clients prefer to bring an external production company in to a venue while some will always opt for in-house?

When a client choses to source their AV requirements externally, it is usually because they have worked together for a number of projects and have become a preferred supplier. The client may feel that their events have more continuity, relying on the relationship with their supplier to ensure that content is delivered consistently.

In fact, a venue’s in-house AV team is often just as experienced at interpreting and understanding the client’s needs as specialist external suppliers, delivering as reliable and consistent a service as an independent production company. Often, in a short period of time, they can gain a client’s confidence and build a lasting relationship through their skills and expertise.

One of the main benefits of using an in-house AV team is their knowledge of their venue’s capabilities, from the technology available and the building’s infrastructure, to what services would best suit what a client is looking to deliver to their guests. As the in-house AV team is an integral part of the venue’s event team, there will already be a strong working relationship and good communications between the two.

It is understandable that a client may feel unsure about using a team they have not worked with before, so look for indications of quality such as industry awards and testimonials for reassurance, and attend planning meetings before the event to ensure that the AV team is delivering on your brief.

External production teams and internal AV teams can make an excellent combination. Sometimes due to time constraints and timescales between the venue’s bookings, it is difficult for the production company to provide and install all the refinements their client requires.

In-house AV teams can assist in the provision of major parts of the production such as technical support, sound systems, lighting, stage sets, or a combination of these requirements, in order to help production companies meet the tight deadlines.

At Church House we are always happy to work alongside others and we have great working relationships with several external AV company. Working together on projects provides a great opportunity for all involved to share key industry knowledge and skills.

 

Related news

Top accolade for Church House Conference Centre AV team

RSA House launches free venue app for event organisers

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RSA House has launched a free venue app for busy event organisers with iPhones and Android devices. The easy-to-use app works as a virtual brochure displaying information about the venue, including its history, 360-degree images of all 13 event spaces, with details of room capacity and seasonal menus.

Easily accessible on the move, the app allows organisers to contact the venue directly via telephone and email with one touch. Organisers hosting an event at RSA House have access to an event specific area within the app called ‘My Event’. This section creates a virtual hub for events which can be accessed by the event organiser and delegates, allowing them secure access to practical information such as the event schedule, a list of invitees and the menu.

Other specified content can be created and uploaded to the section by the venue’s dedicated event manager.

Corporate sales and marketing manager Tim Barrett-Jolley said: “Our app makes the event organiser’s job easier not only in terms of relaying details of the event to attendees, but it also enables them to keep vital information in one place and accessible at all times no matter where they are. It will be very useful for Hybrid Events, whether connecting offices globally or live streaming, as everyone will have access to timings, speakers, breaks – all the important information.”

51 Buckingham Gate unveils The Cinema Suite

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A new cinema suite created by acclaimed Indian designer Sabyasachi Mukherjee is now available for bookings at luxury Westminster hotel and events venue 51 Buckingham Gate, a Taj Suite and Residences property.

Taking guests on a journey through world cinema, the 1,832 square foot, two-bedroom suite, with dining room, study, powder room and kitchen, has been designed in tribute to the history of film and takes inspiration from motion pictures across the globe. The Cinema Suite opened just ahead of celebrations marking 100 years of Indian film in 1913.

The suite is inspired by 1940s and 1950s Hollywood as well as the Indian Cinema era of the 1950s. Guests will find reference to masters such as Ray, Francis Ford Coppola and Bergman in the imposing study, world cinema leaders like Majidi, Wong Kar-Wai and Almodovar amongst the cultured kitch of the living room and echoes of The Stepford Wives in the kitchen. They will sense the golden Hollywood era of Rita Hayworth and Marilyn Monroe in one bedroom, whilst the other draws on colonial inspiration and renowned Indian artists such as Guru Dutt, Merchant Ivory and Bimal Roy.

The suite is a celebration of personalised detail and global culture. Visitors will marvel at rare Bollywood film prints, remarkable history books, vintage mirrors and a myriad of portraits and drawings.

From the leather Chesterfield to precious glassware, intriguing art and antique rugs, world arts and crafts are displayed throughout. Each wall is a work of art in itself, with striking Nina Campbell wallpapers in burnt orange, black and red, laden with curios collected from over 32 different cultures.  Sumptuous silk drapery meets magnificent oak flooring, while priceless antique furniture displays ornaments such as rare Chinese porcelain, Bhutanese frames and 1920s embroidered Indian lamps.

The Cinema Suite is an urban cocoon featuring cutting-edge technology which perfectly blends in with the glamorous design. The 85-inch plasma cinema screen, with a 3D state of the art home theatre system, is one of the biggest private screens in any London hotel suite. It is assisted by a world class Steinway Lyngdorf cinema system, a fully immersive cinematic experience and it raises the bar in terms in-hotel audio visual offerings

The system has been preloaded with a repertoire of 300 international motion pictures, books and music, chosen by Sabyasachi himself, to acknowledge that time is well spent amongst films, art and culture.

The Cinema Suite is the second designer collaboration for 51 Buckingham Gate, following the launch of the world’s first Jaguar Suite which was conceived by Jaguar Design Director Ian Callum and opened at the hotel in autumn 2011.

Rates at The Cinema Suite start at £5,100 per night.  For reservations please call 020 7769 7766 or click here to see the venue’s profile and enquiry instructions.

Top accolade for Church House Conference Centre AV team

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Church House Conference Centre’s in-house AV team has won a prestigious industry award for its high quality service.

At the annual AV Awards, held on October 12 2012 at the London Hilton on Park Lane, the Westminster venue was chosen as the winner of the In-House AV Team of the Year category. The award was collected by AV manager Ian Locke and AV technician Jonathan Hills. It is the second time in three years that the venue has won the award, previously winning in 2010. It was also a finalist in 2011.

Church House Conference Centre offers state-of-the-art AV facilities which are managed by its highly professional team. The venue hosts a wide range of events, including gala dinners, product launches, cocktail receptions, award ceremonies, AGMs, conferences and board meetings, for which the AV team offer a seamless and flexible service.

By closely monitoring customer feedback and keeping up to date with the latest trends, the AV team is able to continuously improve its service offering and client experience. To keep ahead of client requirements, the venue has made significant investment in technology, equipment and people in the last 12 months. Its most recent upgrade was the installation of a 100MB per second broadband line which will mean Church House Conference Centre can accommodate even the most challenging audio visual requirements.

“We’re delighted that our in-house AV team has been recognised for its first class service,” says Robin Parker, Church House Conference Centre’s general manager. “With a wide range of technology and skills at their disposal, the AV team can offer clients a package suitable for events of any type or size. The team are the perfect example of how good practice, staff retention and investment in technology and infrastructure, as well as employee training and development, can provide clients with an exceptional AV experience and create a culture of AV excellence.”