News

The Finishing Touch Wins Silver at the Eventia UK Awards 2008

The Finishing Touch are delighted to announce winning Silver in the Best New Event category for the unique event we created to celebrate the launch of Debenhams Spring/Summer collection at Portman Square Gardens. The winners were announced on Friday 21st November 2008 at The Troxy. It was a glamorous night of awards held to honour the most outstanding, creative and innovative events held in the UK.

Building on Success - an 'Outstanding Successful Conference'

The Finishing Touch provided full audio visual, production, design and implementation elements along with onsite event management to deliver The National Extended Schools Conference at the Royal Lancaster Hotel in London. This event was sponsored by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF), Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) and the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust (SSAT). 

 The high profile conference attracted 500 delegates and including guest presenters with key note addresses by the Rt Hon Beverley Hughes MP, Minister and the Rt Hon Ed Balls MP, Secretary of State for Education. The opening of the conference, chaired by journalist and broadcaster Mike Baker, was provided by twenty pupils from Kingsdale Foundation School performing a drumming routine. This was accompanied by a short film further explaining the Extended Schools core offer and its impact in Schools to date which provided a powerful start to the day. Dame Kelly Holmes, double Olympic gold medalist and the first National School Sports Champion as appointed by the Youth Sport Trust, provided an inspirational speech focusing on individual children’s dreams and helping to facilitate such goals. Handheld voting and messaging devices provided a means of capturing accurate delegate data throughout the day which was then fed back to the Department for analysis to base future events around.  The conference was described by the client as ‘outstandingly successful’ with The Finishing Touch identified as doing ‘a thorough and professional job well done’.

VenuesFirst for a First Choice Solution

Every great event starts with a great venue. In January 2009, The Finishing Touch will be taking our already successful venue finding service and re-launching the service and calling it VenuesFirst. Using this free venue finding service our ever capable, service driven team will deliver first choice solutions to our client’s events. Through our exceptional buying power, knowledge and strong relationships with venues we can offer our clients the right choice of venues at the lowest rates to make their event a success!

Fusion of Themes

The Finishing Touch held an exclusive 50th birthday party at Warren House in Kingston. The venue was transformed into a space themed disco and Indian Chill Out room offering a delicious menu that combined the two! The 80 guests arrived throughout the day giving them time to enjoy the idyllic grounds and afternoon tea in the lounge before donning their glad rags in preparation for the sumptuous Indian meal. Trays of champagne welcomed guests into the lounge whilst a Sitar and Tabla Duo provided atmospheric music before the doors opened to reveal a stunning setting for dinner; twinkling tealights, striking floral table center’s and lighting transformed this already beautiful room into something extra special. A fabulous dinner was enjoyed whilst a roaming magician entertained the tables. The dinner was closed with speeches before the guests made their way to the space room to dance the night away, and dance they did! Following the disco, guests made the most of the Indian chill out room relaxing and chatting over drinks until the early hours!

An Evening of Hospitality

The Finishing Touch would like to thank ‘The Montague on the Gardens’ for partnering with us on a client evening in their beautiful conservatory. With its understated elegance this charming hotel set amongst the pristine gardens found in the heart of Bloomsbury provided the perfect backdrop for our networking evening. Guests were welcomed with champagne and canapés before being whisked off to the British Museum to enjoy an exclusive evening viewing of the highly acclaimed Hadrian’s Wall exhibition. Mel Atkins, MD of The Finishing Touch commented that this was “the perfect time and place to meet with past and present clients to update them on what’s new and how we can work closer with them to develop their events programme in a relaxed and enjoyable environment after all...this industry is all about face-to-face communication and so we simply practice what we preach.”

We intend to hold special showcases of this nature in the future. If you want to find out more about The Finishing Touch and the services we provide or would simply like the opportunity to enjoy some of this fabulous hospitality please do not hesitate to get in touch! We will be happy to keep you updated on these exclusive evenings and hopefully get the chance to meet you at one of the events.

This Month We Are Loving The Lowry Theatre in

Stunning, imposing and unique, the Lowry Theatre stands on a magnificent waterside location at the very heart of the redeveloped Salford Quays. Built at the cost of £96 million and featuring glass and metallic surfaces this inspired building is a perfect example of modern architecture. Home to two main theatres, a gallery and flexible event space the Lowry offers some of the best views of ’s famous Salford Quays. As a charitable organisation all income generated sustains the magnificent building, their amazing programme of activities and the ‘Walkabout’ project. ‘Walkabout’ is about venturing into deprived areas of the community and creating cultural projects which aim to provide local people with the tools to realize their passions and ideas.