Posts in category: News

As the year draws to a close and I’ve managed to get all my events and associated tasks done for the year, I finally have time to reflect on what has been a great year for Lucy Claire Events.

This time last year, I was reflecting on a really tough 2021 and, in all honestly, I didn’t know how 2022 was going to go. It was an uncertain and nerve-wracking time, but I am so thrilled that 2022 has exceeded my expectations and next year looks to be even better.

What has been so wonderful for me this year is being able to curate and witness incredibly magical, in-person moments. Whether that’s a boss being able to treat their team and thank them for all their hard work, a family getting together to celebrate missed celebrations or friends and colleagues just loving being together again.

Each event is incredibly special, and it is not lost on me how lucky I am to organise such a diverse range of events that are so personal and special to so many people.

This year has been hectic, no doubt, but there have been some real stand-out events and moments. Here are a few of my top ones below and a huge thank you to everyone that has worked with me this year – I am extremely grateful.

A Founders Retreat at Wasing Park

Back in May, I worked with an American venture capital client to organise a retreat for 55 founders of start-up companies from all over the world at the beautiful Wasing Park near Newbury. To supplement the wonderful accommodation on site, we set up a glamping area with lovely green field views. Guests were given little touches such as hot water bottles, storm lanterns and eco-friendly bath products, and also experienced an African drumming session, a moonlit walk, wild swimming and a sauna each morning followed by yoga.

Safe to say, everyone had an amazing time – let’s hope we can do something again next year. Watch this space!

Natural History Museum

As far as venues go, it doesn’t get much better than the Natural History Museum. It was an honour to organise two events for two different clients in the same week in the Earth Halls. The first was an Appreciation Evening for my client’s clients with a private viewing of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition as well as music from a lovely string trio. Then, I was back for an evening with Ben Fogle with another client, which was definitely one of my highlights of the year. What an inspiring man!

San Sebastián

A massive treat this year was working with the fab Sammy Daniels from Connect Ventures on a trip for the team and their other halves to the stunning San Sebastián. They ate, drank, surfed, hiked, drank and ate some more (including a 15-course tasting menu!) and had an incredible time. Definitely on my list to visit next year!

Stockholm

In August, I headed to Sweden for the first time and utterly loved it! I was there freelancing for another events company with a group of 19 people and I loved how easy Stockholm is to get around. The food, drink, speed boating around the islands and ice sculpting were amazing!! Everyone had a fabulous time.

Awards Dinner at Four Seasons

In October, we organised our client’s European Women In Finance Awards at Four Seasons London Ten Trinity for 120 guests. The ceremony was held in the stunning Merchants Hall with guests enjoying a drinks reception and delicious dinner. I’m very happy to say we received some fabulous feedback!

Dinner at The Courtauld

This was a magical event, and I loved every minute of it! It started with a drink reception accompanied by music from the Southbank Sinfonia, followed by a delicious dinner courtesy of Bubble Food. The venue was just incredible with its six galleries showcasing some of the greatest and most-loved works from The Courtauld’s collection from the Renaissance to the 18^th Century. Very memorable indeed.

Are you a glamper? The rise in popularity of glamping has been incredible, and it is definitely not limited to those wanting a bit of luxury at a festival anymore. Glamping is a viable option to add space, capacity and a fantastic dimension to an event.

A recent corporate retreat I organised at Wasing Park proved how invaluable glamping is. It not only offered guests a great experience and luxury but as an events planner, crucially, allowed for more bedroom space!! This can be a real game changer for venues to offer higher capacity events.

Glamping is a treat and offers people the excitement of camping and the fun that goes with that, but includes those luxuries that are super appreciated in a field: a bed, mirror, duvet, table! Gone are the days of crouching in a tent with a shoddy compact trying to put your mascara on!

The glamping industry is booming (the global glamping market size was valued at USD 2.35 billion in 2021!) and alongside the home-from-home luxuries, glamping companies are seeing the potential as an incredible add on to existing venues – especially ones with grounds! Gone are the days where capacity is just how many bedrooms a place has, there is now the opportunity for glamping companies to swoop in and accommodate a lot more people, meaning venues are able to attract larger audiences, and therefore larger ticket prices. A win / win.

Glamping is definitely feeling more the norm with many people opting for it over traditional camping, especially in the over 30s where there is more disposable income. People are wanting that added comfort in the great outdoors and who can blame them.

Getting your gang together for a glamping holiday can be incredible and with companies now offering add-ons such as classes and lessons (eg yoga, axe throwing, foraging etc), it can be a fabulous experience for all. In the corporate world, leaders are seeing the benefits of glamping for retreats and away days, much like at Wasing Park, where they could sauna and swim in the lake and head back to their glamping site!

It would have arguably been a step too far to suggest a corporate away day in a traditional camping field with the shared loo and shower, but with glamping taking the edge off, people are definitely exploring it more.

Do let me know your experiences – are you a glamper? Or just glamping curious?

A very welcome trend in the events industry is hearing from both private and corporate clients who want to host their events in charitable venues. By this, I mean venues that give back in some way, have a charitable and sustainable arm and offer a circular investment.

Many venues are taking note of this and revisiting their policies on charity and sustainability which is brilliant to see, resulting in many offering events spaces at a reduced rate, or even free space, for select events with a charitable angle. Alternatively, many are partnering or affiliating themselves with certain charities or causes in order to give back and support through money made on their events.

It is refreshing to see that the days when pure commercial goals were paramount in event spaces are distant and, thanks to the rise of awareness about causes and sustainability factors, event spaces are offering more of an organic and holistic approach that benefits many more people than themselves.

People wanting to host events are incredibly in-tune to this and their demands are, rightly, high. People are not entertaining venues who do not have a charitable facet or who don’t have sustainability high on their agenda. Instead, due to the pool of venues and new offerings, they take their business elsewhere leaving these venues dangerously exposed and looking out of date.

As event professionals, understanding the venues we work with and their sustainability and charitable agendas is high on our list and we always ensure that they are on point with our values and clients’ needs as well as keeping up to date with the ever-evolving developments and implementations. We are proud to work with venues to educate and support on these areas which is so rewarding, as even the smallest changes and in-roads can make huge differences.

Here are a few examples of what venues could be doing immediately:

• Swapping out all plastic where you can
• Changing your electricity supplier
• Affiliating yourself with a charity – a local one to the venue often works really well
• Aligning your values as a venue
• Setting out exactly how you will give back – this doesn’t always have to be monitory. Could you donate unwanted food to a food bank, for example?

These are all relatively small things but things that your clients, and potential clients, will love you for and could be the difference in them choosing your venue over a competitor. It can feel like an enormous task, especially with phases such as ‘net zero’ banded about, but we are all here to support each other and learn as we go by taking things step by step.

So, if you are a venue who would like to discuss your charitable angle more – we would love to help. Do get in touch and together we can ensure each and every venue is doing as much as it can for the greater good. And who doesn’t want that?

There is no denying that the pandemic was pretty brutal for a lot of us, and most definitely for the events industry. However, one of the good things to emerge from it is the sense of camaraderie and community from both businesses and customers. For many of us, it meant we got to know our fellow businesses in our vicinity and what was there under our noses that perhaps we hadn’t taken notice of before. This is certainly true for me when I launched the wine and cheese packages, as it allowed me to work with some exceptional local partners and get to know their businesses and, I’m happy to say, I still work with them today.

From a customer perspective, lockdown gave us the opportunity to get to know the businesses that were super local to us, rather than our go-to ones when we jumped in the car. Many of these businesses went above and beyond to ensure we were looked after by sourcing stock, selling much-needed items and meeting the demand that many of the bigger names just couldn’t do. And this hasn’t been forgotten.

With this is mind, one of the wonderful trends to emerge already this year is the way venues in the same location are working together to collaborate and offer people something extra special. Many businesses who complement each other are joining forces to offer fantastic 360 events packages allowing clients some incredible multi-layered events.

A great example of this are the businesses near the beautiful Mayfair Townhouse in London. This is a gorgeous building stooped in history and offers a fabulous bar as well as meeting rooms and bedrooms. However, only a stone’s throw away is the Curzon cinema, so by these two businesses working together, they can offer clients a very tantalising private screening event with dinner and drinks and somewhere to stay all in one. This is hugely appealing for brands who perhaps have a product launch or a film to show as every aspect has been catered for. As an events planner, we can step in and add extra layers too when needed, such as booking a great restaurant for dinner, all in the same area and all in the same ilk as the client’s brief and budget.

For those venues that maybe aren’t buddying up yet, there is a desire to do so and we are helping a lot with that. As events professionals, we make it our business to get to know the many great venues and their offerings. It is getting increasingly rare that one venue can cater for all a clients’ requirements as many are so complex, so it is up to us to find more than one venue that will seamlessly transition to make the event as magical as possible. This could be finding a great space to host meetings or presentations during the day, but then afterwards finding that perfect private dining room for guests to enjoy dinner and drinks, followed by a boutique hotel for a nightcap and to stay.

Often, it can be left to team members to source venues and this can often be overwhelming, especially if they don’t know an area. We take all that stress away and build a perfect package in line with your brief and budget.

I really hope the emergence of collaboration between venues keeps growing and many more like-minded businesses collaborate and showcase each other’s services to their customer base. Support and championing are definitely the order of the day!

There are some incredible new venues opening in 2022, and I cannot wait to explore what they have to offer and get my creative juices flowing for the best events and experiences to host there! 

Here are a few of my favourite new venues: 

One Hundred Shoreditch, London  

Yes, I know London is not short of a hotel or two, but this new offering in the heart of Shoreditch looks something extra special! Housing 258 bedrooms, six restaurants and bars with one boasting a panoramic view of East London, the plans are big. Alongside this, it has five meeting and event rooms catering for intimate and large get togethers as well as its One Hundred Room which boasts floor to ceiling glass and breath-taking views. 

I cannot wait to visit this one and check out the décor which is promised to be full of pink marble and bright spaces, with a big focus on sustainability and ethical sourcing.  

Fairmont, Windsor Park  

This has been a long wait. I remember seeing the computer images of what the interior and exterior of the hotel would look like, and I now can’t wait to visit. It’s top of my list!  

Dripping in decadent luxury it is huge! Located on the edge of the gorgeous Windsor Great Park, the hotel is surrounded by 40 acres of grounds, including a beautiful lake. It offers more than 200 rooms and suites that ooze soft tones and textures, and also houses a spa and wellness centre boasting state of the art innovation with luxurious and decadent surroundings. 

In one wing of the hotel, they have 15 meeting rooms catering for all needs as well as a massive ballroom that can host up to 700 guests. This will be such a fantastic addition to the area and I already know, I’ll be organising events here!  

Art’otel, Battersea 

Another London venue set to open this summer is taking up residency in the former power station development at Battersea and features skyline floors, rooftop pool and bar and a destination restaurant and bar. This is the group’s first UK hotel, and it promises to be brimming with art-inspired interiors and décor!

OWO Residences, London 

This is going to be London’s first Raffles Hotel featuring nine restaurants and bars and an immersive spa. The building itself is completely iconic having been the Old War Office. Having stood at Whitehall for over 100 years, people including Sir Winston Churchill and Ian Fleming have all walked the corridors of what was the Ministry of Defence headquarters.  

The new space will have 125 rooms and specific event spaces. I can’t wait to discover this new gem in London town!  

Chateau Denmark, London   

This is a spot with quite some history as it was inspired by the birthplace of the British music scene – Denmark Street in London, where The Rolling Stones recorded their first album, the Sex Pistols once lived, and it was rumoured to be where Ziggy Stardust was created. This new space boasts 55 bedrooms and apartments, named ‘session rooms’. Each have their own individual stories and are divided by four narratives: vintage gothic, timeless grandeur, modern psychedelia and punk now.

Due to open in the spring, Chateau Denmark is being lauded as the largest immersive space of its kind anywhere in the world! I definitely will be making sure I am one of the first through its doors!  

If any of these sound up your street for an event, please do get in touch and we can get planning!

The Countdown Summit in Edinburgh is underway leading to COP26 in Glasgow and I cannot wait to hear the speeches, promises and commitments from world leaders regarding sustainability, net zero and climate change. 

I cannot wait to hear from the people coming together for The Countdown Summit as it promises to unveil some imaginative and scalable solutions that we all need to turn the tide on climate change and create a healthier and more equitable world for all. 

As they say, a net-zero future is possible which is why the Summit is being held as a gathering for politicians, business leaders, policy makers, scientists, Indigenous leaders, artists, philanthropists, youth activists and others to organise and work together to make that future a reality. I will definitely be listening intently. 

COP26 is the headline act where world leaders will gather in Glasgow to discuss how to collectively tackle climate change. The top line aims of the conference are: 

• To secure global net zero by mid-century and keep 1.5 degrees within reach 
• Adapt to protect communities and natural habitats 
• Mobilise finance 
• Work together to deliver 

These are all huge asks so it will be fascinating to hear what the various leaders have to say and what barriers will be in place in order to achieve it. Even though these aims don’t obviously impact the events industry on the surface, when really thought about they are very impactful indeed.  

In the past few years there has definitely been a sea change in the events world as both organisers and clients are demanding each event to be as sustainable as possible. This goes far beyond just replacing plastic straws. There are intricacies in terms of digital footprint, having a clear transparency on your supply chain and the layers that go with that as well as researching venues thoroughly and knowing what to ask, look out for, question and change, where possible.  

In reference to the ‘adapt to protect communities’ point, this means that we have to build and maintain reliant infrastructure in order to protect our lives and where we live, and this goes down to the smallest of detail. For us, I have to ask – what could we do better? What systems does Lucy Claire Events have in place to be as sustainable as possible in order to lessen the damaging impact on our world and each other?  

These are big questions and ones I will be thinking about very carefully. So, will I swap my petrol car for an electric? Will I aim to radically reduce my travel? Will I just use British suppliers? On this last point, I am pleased to say 99% of the time I do, but it needs to be a conscious 100% going forwards.  

As a business we really need to know our suppliers and their methods of working even more than we do already and understand their values and commitment to net zero and if we can work together to achieve it.  

Lots of food for thought but we are so ready for it!  

So, I can’t lie, the past 18 months have been incredibly challenging for me and Lucy Claire Events. It has been a case of digging deep and surviving but now with things (everything crossed) getting back to normal, I can finally take a breath and look back with a sense of pride, as I not only got through it, but I surpassed our abilities, added new skillsets and showed some dogged resilience to boot. 

I finally took some time to reflect recently and I have to say, I’m pretty chuffed with myself. And trust me, I don’t normally say that! It has been tough no doubt but in a weird way – I am further along in my business than I ever would have been if it were ‘business as usual’. I have managed to rebrand and get a new website that truly reflects me, and Lucy Claire Events and I have become consistent on social media. This is something that I knew was so imperative to my success, as many of my potential clients check my social before my website and I get a lot of comments and people finding me this way.  

Alongside this, I have organised alternative events, to those that were supposed to happen, with very short lead times and transitioned live events to online with a hugely fast turnaround due to the government guidelines changing and the goalposts moving. This includes a client’s conference and exhibition that was moved four times and pulling together a brand-new event in only a week – that was, thankfully, a great success.  

A big achievement for me was to look at alternate routes to market. Last autumn I collaborated with two local businesses, Woodchester Valley Vineyard and The Cotswold Cheese Company, to produce a beautiful hamper for both private and corporate clients, together with an optional online Cotswold wine and cheese tasting. This was a huge learning for me in light of logistics and packing and shipping perishable goods – I will never forget just being surrounded by boxes, cheese and wine at home and taking great pleasure putting the boxes together! I will also never forget the barriers when trying to ship a few boxes over to Europe, and the odd occasional courier problem around the UK – one time I spent a Sunday dropping off 11 hampers around the south of England!  

Over the past 18 months the events I have organised and hosted have not been huge, as many of my clients have preferred to wait for the return of live events. However, I have loved those that have hosted these smaller events, as they have put their teams and staff at the heart of what they do. We have worked together on their team socials and looked at different ways to entertain their clients to ensure they know they are supporting them. It’s been a challenge coming up with innovative ideas to engage, support and entertain, but we succeeded, and have some very happy clients and guests.   

During this time, I have worked with some fantastic new clients and had the opportunity to network far more than I had before. It’s been wonderful making so many new connections, meeting new industry friends and new clients, especially locally – something we just wouldn’t have been able to do if things were normal.  

It’s been tough, no doubt, but there are some really amazing things to have come out of this time and I have to say a huge, massive thank you to my clients, suppliers and connections for your continued support and belief in me and my business and, even when things were tough, you stuck with me. 

Being a great leader has evolved and changed considerably as the physical space has been removed. This has seen good leaders adapting their style, fully understanding their audiences and embracing the new way of working. 

This is not easy, and unfortunately a number of leaders have fallen by the wayside as they have kept on leading like they always have, failing to connect with their workforce and identifying what their needs and expectations are. These leaders’ shift has been virtual only and their demands, methods, output and expectations have not changed, meaning that they have lost sight of their employees and, in turn, have suffered because of that. 

But I am very happy to say, there are a lot of leaders out there who are not like the aforementioned and have altered their leadership styles for the world we are now living in and a big part of this is looking after those in their charge. 

As you know, we have been running a number of virtual events over lockdown. These are great fun, fantastic ways to let off some steam and get people together – but they are also so much more than that. 

These events are a sign of great leadership. The managers, leaders, CEOs that have come to me asking to work with us on delivering an event for their staff have one vital thing in common – they understand and are aware of their employees’ welfare. To me, this depicts innovative leadership as even though, on the surface, they are just organising a fun get-together, what they are really doing is showing their teams they are grateful, they care and that they are appreciated. 

This is a hugely powerful subliminal message to give, as allowing a platform for camaraderie, teamwork and togetherness where the ‘leader’ is not in their traditional leadership role and is at times vulnerable and on par to their team members shows someone who is confident in their role and who understands their team and its needs.  Humility and vulnerability are definitely powerful traits in leaders, especially at the moment.  

I say this a lot, but the power of events is huge and even though in-person events cannot happen at the moment, there is still so much you can do virtually. So, if you are a leader or a manager and have a team working for you, do have a think about events and how you can reward your team in this way.  

As event professionals, we ensure that your event is personal to your team and that the added touches make it hugely memorable. The corporate events we have already done, I am thrilled to say, have received some fantastic testimonials and many repeat bookings so if you are looking for a way to show your leadership and to thank your team, we’d love to hear from you. 

Our precious events industry has taken severe knocks in the past year and events as we knew and loved them are no more with many professionals waiting in the wings to start working in the industry they love again.

I can’t lie, it’s been an emotional rollercoaster the past year working in events with a lot of anger, frustration and sadness seeing friends, colleagues, venues and organisations suffer and fall. There is a deep feeling that this could have been avoided with better guidance and leadership, which make the emotions even more raw, but sadly we are where we are and we have to try and regain some semblance of our industry from the ashes.

What comforts me is the power and magic of events. There is no feeling like it – being with your group of people, sharing an experience in that exact moment and celebrating the emotions that go with that. I talk a lot about making memories and events do just that. When you think back to your happiest of times, I bet events feature highly. It’s that sense of occasion, celebration, togetherness and euphoria that is so powerful and so hugely memorable.

I have no doubt in my mind that the events industry will be back stronger than ever as soon as allowed, but there will always be a sadness about those that didn’t make it. I hope more than anything they reincarnate into something bigger and better. We are all seeing an almost chomping-at-the-bit desire to connect and be together from both private and corporate worlds and gone is the need for physical things and their once grave importance, replaced with the desire to be with those we cherish.

Even though the ever-present pandemic has been uncategorically rough on most of us, the glimmer of positivity for me has been people’s realisation of their need for others and their need to experience, laugh, sing, dance and just be together. We were in fear of the perceived need for things replacing what really matters – connection, and I cannot wait to organise amazing events for people to be together. It’s going to be emotional!