Blogs

In one of the many private rooms available to book in Birmingham Town Hall is a picture of a stage coach pulling up outside the front door back in Victorian times. It is one of a collection of fascinating pictures hanging in the Town Hall depicting its role in national and local events over the decades. Just outside the front door today space is already prepared for a tram stop when the extension of the still-to-open Birmingham tram system is extended from New Street Station up Broad Street. It is good to see the old Town Hall celebrating its past as well as looking forward to the future.

Birmingham Town Hall was one of four central Birmingham venues we were being shown around. It was the oldest and to my mind the best, but I am biased. I have happy memories of attending pop concerts there in the past. Even though the Town Hall has undergone a £30million, eleven year refurbishment before finally reopening in 2007, the Grade I-listed building is largely unchanged. It now has a modern, stylish décor but it still retains its grandeur. It will seat up to 900 delegates for a conference (350 guests for a banquet) with the latest technology and plenty of breakout spaces.

Symphony Hall on the other hand is purpose-built and technically one of the finest concert halls and conference centres in the world. Symphony Hall is a close neighbour of the Town Hall and is the larger of the two venues seating up to 2000 delegates. Apparently there is sufficient business coming into Birmingham that the venues don’t need to fight amongst themselves to attract it. Symphony Hall has just installed a flat floor option in the main concert hall which enables the venue to be used for dinners and banquets. It is a temporary removable wooden flooring system which fits over the tiered seating beneath. When we viewed the main auditorium it was set up for a dinner and it looked simply stunning. The fact that Symphony Hall has a covered walkway over Broad Street to the Hyatt Regency Hotel opposite makes it a very attractive proposition for major events.

Birmingham Rep was our third venue. The newly refurbished and extended Birmingham Repertory Theatre rubs shoulders with Symphony Hall on one side and the new Birmingham Library, to which it is linked, on the other side – useful when the Rep needs even more breakout space than it already has and poaches rooms from the Library. The main auditorium and studio theatre remain with the addition of a new flexible 300-seat theatre with state of the art facilities plus three modern flexible and fully equipped meeting rooms overlooking Centenary Square. The Rep works well for delegate numbers up 300 - especially if ‘unusual and quirky’ is on the menu.

All three venues have a full catering package from light refreshments to a full-blown banquet.

The fourth venue we visited was the smallest. It is tucked away behind Symphony Hall at the front and the newly renamed Barclaycard Indoor Arena at its rear. It was IET Austin Court and what it lacks in size is more than compensated by its style. The building was once a metal and nail merchants and whilst it has been fully restored it still retains its essential character with exposed brick walls and wooden beams, not to mention its direct access on to the Birmingham canal system at Brindleyplace. A new glass atrium has been added at the entrance enhancing the building which also benefits from a secluded courtyard garden. Austin Court boasts an excellent range of flexible meeting rooms all fully equipped with the latest IT infrastructure, which frankly you would expect from a venue operated by IET (Institution of Engineering and Technology).

In terms of access all four venues are within a few minutes walk of New Street Station. There are at least a dozen three and four star hotels within a short walking distance. Austin Court does benefit from having a limited number of parking spaces on site which are pre-bookable but there is a multi-storey car park which serves all four venues with very competitive rates for city centre parking. For those of you who consider driving in Birmingham city centre a ‘white-knuckle’ experience best avoided, be assured it is relatively easy to approach all four venues from the M6 without getting hopelessly lost.
Capacity and catering details can be found on all four venue websites.

Details: Published: 20 January 2015; Hits: 3763

Club Liverpool is a new initiative which has just been launched by Marketing Liverpool. It is the city’s new-look ambassador programme promoting Liverpool as a conference and events destination.

Club Liverpool is being led by Marketing Liverpool working in partnership with ACC Liverpool, home to BT Convention Centre, Echo Arena and Exhibition Centre Liverpool which is due to open later this year.

Liverpool’s 'ambassadors' have helped attract more than 120 national and international events to the city since the programme started in 2004.Club Liverpool plans to build on these past successes. Club Liverpool currently includes more than 100 leading members of Liverpool’s medical, academic, business and cultural industries. The new programme includes a refreshed website which enables ambassadors to access event news, networking opportunities and key information.

Existing ambassador Prof John Hunt from the University of Liverpool, said: “Being part of the ambassadors programme allows you to more formally connect with all the help that’s available in the city for hosting events, and lets others see how fantastic the city is”.

Details: www.clubliverpool.co.uk

Details: Published: 20 January 2015; Hits: 3710

That London is the busiest city in Europe for hotel development will come as no surprise to any traveller. With 17,919 bedrooms under contract in the capital, it is well ahead of Istanbul in second place with 7,487 bedrooms in its pipeline.

The surprise is Manchester. With 4,362 hotel rooms under contract in the city it is a long way ahead of several leading European capitals including Moscow (3,563 rooms); Amsterdam (3,507 rooms); Berlin (2,540 rooms) and Munich (2,433 rooms).

Projects under contract include those in construction, final planning and planning stages. The statistics have been published in the November 2014 STR Global Construction Pipeline Report.

Details: Published: 19 December 2014; Hits: 3690

Brentwood House is a new meeting venue located on the outskirts of Preston City centre. It is home to Community Futures which aims to promote and develop social, economic, and cultural and community activity in Lancashire, working through voluntary groups.

The building itself has undergone extensive refurbishment recently to provide high quality meeting room facilities for voluntary sector organisations. Meeting rooms include the Captain Steve Gaunt Room, a Victorian-period boardroom which will accommodate up to ten delegates. The smaller Mrs Doris Abraham MBE Room will accommodate up to four delegates for informal meetings and interviews.

Brentwood House is fully equipped with the latest IT technology. There are laptops, projectors, screens and cameras available to hire as well as ICT technical support. Refreshments are available during the day as well as a range of hot and cold food. There is limited free car parking in the grounds and plenty of street parking in the vicinity.

Brentwood House is located in Victoria Road, Fulwood just north of the centre of Preston and five minutes from the M6 and M55 motorways.

Details: www.communityfutures.org.uk

Details: Published: 15 January 2015; Hits: 3775

The Geffrye Museum in Hoxton, east London is a museum of the home. It is housed in a row of Grade 1-listed, 18th century alms-houses and the museum records and traces the changes in ‘living space’ since around the year 1600. It is a totally absorbing place to spend a morning seeing how our ancestors lived before the days of modern household conveniences. The museum chronicles the furnishings and how the rooms were heated, lit and lived in - and how they changed over time responding to changes in domestic life. The herb gardens behind the museum are just as fascinating – an urban oasis in the heart of Hoxton.

This year marks 100 years since the Geffrye Museum first opened and 300 years since the alms-houses first opened. To mark these twin anniversaries the Geffrye Museum has unveiled plans to increase space at the museum by around 40%. The new-look museum will include new galleries, a new café and conference facilities, as well as rejuvenating the current public spaces.

Hoxton Overground station is at the rear of the Geffrye Museum – a two minute walk at the most. However, I walked from Old Street tube station to the Geffrye Museum. It is a journey which takes you from Silicon Roundabout at the vibrant and frenetic heart of the modern, creative London with its cluster of tech firms, way back to Victorian times and beyond - in less than ten minutes. It struck me that the Geffrye Museum could be an excellent venue for a meeting or brain storming session – the perfect catalyst for sparking the creative juices.

Take a look at the Geffrye Museum if you have time to spare in London – entry is free (but donations are welcome).

Details: www.geffrye-museum.org.uk

Details: Published: 15 December 2014; Hits: 4072

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Refurbishment Round-up