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Mix and Mingle!

Wednesday, October 19th, 2011

Today we want to remind you about our wedding planners Mix and Mingle nights on 19 and 20 October in various stunning locations across the UK.  It’s a perfect opportunity for new and not so new planners to get together at the end of the season, compare notes and tips, let off steam and be the ones hosted at the party for a change! Our UKAWP members always love our social evenings but our events are open to non-members too and also to recent students of UKAWP who may not have launched their business but are on the way.

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The evening starts at 6:30pm and finishes by 9:30pm, even if you can only make it for an hour the directors and members would love to see you there. Tickets are £10 for members of UKAWP and £15 for non members. To register please go here

Mix and Mingle Reminder

Monday, October 3rd, 2011

Today we want to remind you about our wedding planners Mix and Mingle nights on 19 and 20 October in various stunning locations across the UK.  It’s a perfect opportunity for new and not so new planners to get together at the end of the season, compare notes and tips, let off steam and be the ones hosted at the party for a change! Our UKAWP members always love our social evenings but our events are open to non-members too and also to recent students of UKAWP who may not have launched their business but are on the way.

I’m going to tell you a little bit about some of the venues who have very kindly agreed to host us for these special evenings.  At each venue you will have a chance to look around their space for weddings and meet their teams.

London on 20 October is hosted by BMA House

BMA House

BMA House

A hidden gem in gorgeous Bloomsbury, BMA House is a Grade II listed property situated in the heart of London. Designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, BMA House is located on the site of Charles Dickens’ former home in Tavistock Square. It has been the home of the British Medical Association, the professional association for doctors, since 1925. The venue holds 4 unique rooms with a wedding licence, accommodating up to 200 people for the reception, an outdoor courtyard and garden for wedding photos and drinks, perfect for all seasons. Our Menus have been designed by our on-site Executive Head Chef from our award-winning caterers, Baxter Storey, and offer innovative menu design, premium ingredients and stunning presentation.

 Cheshire on 20 October is hosted by  Doubletree by Hilton Chester

Double Tree by Hilton

Double Tree by Hilton

Set on the outskirts of historic Chester and surrounded by 12 acres of landscaped gardens, the elegant DoubleTree by Hilton Chester hotel provides luxurious facilities for an outstanding wedding venue. This carefully restored 18th century manor house beautifully combines the past and the present, offering luxurious accommodation with contemporary styling and décor. The DoubleTree by Hilton Chester offers a variety of options for civil ceremonies and partnerships ranging from the enchanting Pagoda for intimate vows, the traditional Abbey suite, a spectacular converted stable barn and the modern Ballroom to cater for larger numbers. 

 Yorkshire on 19 October is hosted by Cedar Court Grand

Cedar Court

Cedar Court

The Cedar Court Grand Hotel & Spa is simply magical. Its sweeping staircases are made for sumptuous photography. Its beautiful architecture is guaranteed to impress. Its rooms are sanctuaries of calm and escape. We don’t do off the shelf, so your wedding will be one-of-a-kind; from a selection of menus crafted by our Head Chef to a choice of personalised stationery, designed with you in mind. From the red-carpet welcome when your guests arrive, right through to your elegantly-appointed bedroom at the end of the day, your wedding at The Grand is a truly unforgettable experience. With a choice of two beautiful rooms to conduct your Ceremony; from the intimate Chairman’s Suite for smaller celebrations, to the historic Grand Boardroom for larger gatherings, we will make your wedding truly unique.

Also taking place on 20 October are our events in Scotland which is hosted by  Blythswood Square, New Forest which is hosted by Chewton Glen and Midlands hosted by Hampton Manor

Our directors and members really look forward to meeting you at one of the events soon. Tickets are £10 for members of UKAWP and £15 for non members. To register please go here

Wedding Planner Mix & Mingle Evening

Monday, September 19th, 2011

Last month we announced our fabulous and varied host venues for the wedding planners  Mix and Mingle night this Autumn and opened bookings. This is your reminder, in case you have yet to book.

Numbers are limited within each venue so please book early to avoid disappointment.   

 All events run simultaneously as follows:

 Thursday 20 October

6.30pm-9.00pm (please come for a short while or stay for the duration)

Format: informal drinks and canapés; each individual venue will be adding their own personal touches

 The only exception to this is the Yorkshire event which will run on Wednesday 19 October from 6.30-9.00pm. 

London

Hosted by BMA House

Organised by Kelly, UK Alliance of Wedding Planners

 New Forest/South Coast

Hosted by Chewton Glen

Organised by Suzanne, RSVP Wedding

 Midlands

Hosted by Hampton Manor

Organised by Carmen, Carmen Weddings

 Cheshire

Hosted by Doubletree by Hilton Chester

Organised by Caroline, Pomp and Ceremony Planning

 Yorkshire

Hosted by Cedar Court Grand

Organised by Nikki, I Do Designer Weddings

 Scotland

Hosted by Blythswood Square

Organised by Louise, Louise MacPherson Wedding Design

 Tickets for all events are priced at £10 for members of UKAWP and £15 for non-members.  All independent planners (established and new) are welcome for an evening for fun, ideas sharing and camaraderie within our very unique slice of the wedding industry. There will be opportunities to view each of the wonderful venues who have kindly agreed to be our hosts for the evening and meet their in-house teams.

 To book your place, please follow this link  http://www.ukawp.com/booking-form-mix-mingle.php

 We can’t wait to see you there!

Photo credit: www.lloyddobbie.com

PR Workshop - last few places

Friday, August 19th, 2011

Tickets are selling fast for our PR Workshop taking place on Wednesday 14 September in London. We have only a few places remaining for this insightful evening so do book your place soon to avoid disappointment.

Nicola Russill-Roy, PR Director and Suzie Dixon, Social Media Editor from Propose PR will be passing on their essential PR tips and advice to help you succeed in this competitive market. Topics include: how to build press contacts, how to communicate effectively with the press and what to avoid.  Propose PR are the first and only specialist wedding PR agency in the UK.

Propose PR

The evening takes place from 6.30-8.30pm and tickets cost £55 for members of UKAWP and £60 for non members. To book your place, please GO HERE

We hope to see you there!

Wedding planners Mix and Mingle - Booking Open

Thursday, August 11th, 2011

It is with much pleasure that we announce our fabulous and varied host venues for the wedding planners  Mix and Mingle night this autumn and open bookings. Numbers are limited within each venue so please book early to avoid disappointment.   

 All events run simultaneously as follows:

 Thursday 20 October

6.30pm-9.00pm (please come for a short while or stay for the duration)

Format: informal drinks and canapés; each individual venue will be adding their own personal touches

 The only exception to this is the Yorkshire event which will run on Wednesday 19 October from 6.30-9.00pm. 

2010 event

 London

Hosted by BMA House

Organised by Kelly, UK Alliance of Wedding Planners

 New Forest/South Coast

Hosted by Chewton Glen

Organised by Suzanne, RSVP Wedding

 Midlands

Hosted by Hampton Manor

Organised by Carmen, Carmen Weddings

 Cheshire

Hosted by Doubletree by Hilton Chester

Organised by Caroline, Pomp and Ceremony Planning

 Yorkshire

Hosted by Cedar Court Grand

Organised by Nikki, I Do Designer Weddings

 Scotland

Hosted by Blythswood Square

Organised by Louise, Louise MacPherson Wedding Design

 Tickets for all events are priced at £10 for members of UKAWP and £15 for non-members.  All independent planners (established and new) are welcome for an evening for fun, ideas sharing and camaraderie within our very unique slice of the wedding industry. There will be opportunities to view each of the wonderful venues who have kindly agreed to be our hosts for the evening and meet their in-house teams.

 To book your place, please follow this link  http://www.ukawp.com/booking-form-mix-mingle.php

 We can’t wait to see you there!

Photo credit: www.lloyddobbie.com

Date for your diaries…..

Wednesday, July 20th, 2011

Mix & mingle wedding planners evening

Launched on our exciting new website last week, we wanted to bring your attention here on the blog to our national mingle & mix evening taking place on Thursday 20 October. In a change from previous years, we’ll be running not 1 or 2 but 6 social evenings simultaneously for wedding planners across the length and breadth of the country on the same night.  If you are a member of UKAWP or a wedding planner who would like to get to know others in your area or more about UKAWP, or even if you’re thinking of starting up and would like to know more, this is the place for you.

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Our autumn social evenings have been running for 3 years and our London get-together has proved really lively, hosting around 50 planners each year. The format is informal and friendly and it’s a genuine opportunity to unwind and relax at the end of the wedding season and to build contacts and knowledge for the next year.

So please put the date in your diaries, registration will open shortly. Ticket prices will be £10 for members, £15 for non members. Each event will run from 6.30-9.00pm.

Exact venue locations are being confirmed currently and some of our wonderful members are helping us with the planning, but destinations are going to be London, Southampton, Birmingham, Cheshire, Yorkshire and Scotland. So although we can never host an evening in everyone’s town, we hope that there will be one for most planners within 1-2 hours travel time.

We hope to see you soon! 

 Photo Credit: Lloyd Dobbie

Newsflash! Membership Restructure

Friday, July 1st, 2011

Today we have announced a complete restructure of our membership criteria and the means for members to be promoted via our newly designed website .

To date there have been only two levels of membership for UK based members and probably not sufficient reason for members to want to move up to the higher level. Henceforth the criteria for promotion will be points based, with members able to earn points through continued education, experience and appropriate publicity; something our current members have welcomed.

Elizabeth Gall, Director of Simply Elegant and member of the UKAWP explains ‘Planners who are already active members of the UKAWP appreciate how this approach supports their aim to promote professionalism within the industry, and by recognising members who take their continuous professional development seriously it will help to raise standards‘.

On application wedding planners will be asked to fill in a simple form which will indicate how many points they begin with: they will then be able to reapply twice per annum for promotion to the next level based on their continued activity.

This is great for our students who, by coming on our courses, automatically start out with points should they later apply for membership.

We are introducing new member logos, which denote each member’s seniority.  New wedding planners have the opportunity to begin as Associate Members, move through three levels of Member and ultimately to become a Supreme Member.

If you are interested in finding out more about the UKAWP’s membership categories, please contact membership@ukawp.com .

Poll on the use of wedding planners

Tuesday, May 24th, 2011

Today we thought we’d share with you the results of a recent poll on the website of You and Your Wedding which was conducted with the UK Alliance of Wedding Planners in mind. 

The poll was conducted at the start of February 2011 and there were 239 responders.

 

Would you use a wedding planner?

 

  • No, I want to do it all myself
  • 55.23%
  • No, I don’t think we can afford it
  • 33.89%
  • Yes, I want help with the whole event
  • 3.77%
  • Maybe, for help with some of the plans
  • 3.77%
  • Yes, I don’t have to time to do it myself
  • 3.35%

 

So looking positively at this, almost 11% of brides will consider having the help of a planner. Whilst we’d all like that percentage to be higher, it’s a step in the right direction. And let’s face it, with 231,490 weddings going on per year (figure from Office for National Statistics in 2009) , that’s a potential audience of 23,149 weddings. Through our research and activity at UKAWP, we believe that there are no more than 200 committed and professional wedding planning companies operating across the UK, so sharing that out amongst them all, that’s 115 weddings each.  A great deal more than most wedding planners can handle annually. Encouraging don’t you think?

Wedding Dress Workshop

Saturday, April 30th, 2011

You only have a couple of days to register for our second evening workshop , in case you missed the details please see below for a reminder:

We are delighted to announce the second in our new quarterly workshops. As wedding planners there are times when we need to use our initiative and fix possible disasters and we hope to cover some of the possible scenarios in our workshops.

After our successful Floral Workshop we are now focusing on the wedding dress. Led by Kay, one of our full members and owner of Heading Up the Aisle it will cover: Dress types & how to lace them/pin them, wedding dress alterations, how design influences alteration cost, wedding day disasters, emergency kit, how to tie a cravat.

The event is being held on Thursday 5th May from 6:30-8:30 at a central London venue – to be announced nearer the time.

Tickets for this workshop are just £55 for members and £60 non members and
you can book here

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Purpose

Workshop for wedding planners to  understand the pitfalls when brides purchase dresses, alterations costs, and also have an idea of how to put on different types of gowns, and what the dress pitfalls are on the day to include hooking up a bustle, lacing a corset, taping up straps which fall down etc.

The evening will also include an outline of useful items for your wedding dress emergency kit specific for fixing bridal gowns disasters, along with tips for planners when attending brides fittings what to ask for regarding alterations and how they are estimated so that you can assist your clients at their appointments if needed.

Overview

1.       Dress Types and practical exercise of lacing them up and pinning.

  • Corset backs
  • Zip backs
  • Zip and buttons

 

corset

Copyright www.kerrymorgan.com

2.       Wedding dress alterations and pitfalls.

  • Questions to ask at the bridal boutique
  • Alterations costs.
  • Average costs and how they are calculated.

3.       How design influences alteration costs

4.       Wedding day disasters with the dress and how to fix them.

  • Finding a bustle
  • Pinning up hems
  • Hooking up the dress for the first dance
  • Taping up straps and sticky strap fastenings

 

5.       Tips for wedding planners emergency kit box

6.       How to tie a cravat on someone else.

7.       Question and answer session.

Wedding Fever hits the media

Sunday, April 24th, 2011

With the Royal Wedding literally just days away it would seem wedding fever has hit the media both here in the UK and abroad.

Foxnews

On Friday 22nd April Kelly Chandler (Marketing Director) was interviewed  for her views on the upcoming Royal Wedding. You can listen to this interview via their website.

fox-news

BBC Essex

On Monday 25th April Bernadette (Training Director) will be in the studio with Sadie Nine who is covering for the Dave Monk show. Bernadette will be on air at around 9:15am. You can listen via here . The discussion will be concentrating on what could go wrong at a wedding.

 

Guardian Online

Bernadette  will be taking part in a live Q&A discussion on ‘How to become a wedding planner’ on Wednesday 27th April. If you are interested in becoming a wedding planner then please join in the discussion where you will learn it’s not just Royal weddings that need some professional help with the planning.

guardian

Radio 4 - Moneybox Programme

After the guardian Q&A session Bernadette will make her way to BBC TV Centre where she will be live on the Moneybox Programme at 3pm to answer all questions regarding money & weddings alongside a panel of experts including:

Christine Ross, Independent Financial Advisor, SG Hambros

Andrea Ventress, deputy editor, Wedding magzine

If you have a question you would like answering please go to the moneybox page for details on how to call or email in.

money_box

Reuters

Bernadette will be taking part in live blogging for Reuters on the 29th April providing commentary and views on the Royal Wedding as it happens. Do pop on by and say hello.