North East England: A venue for every occasion
There are lots of things to consider when you are choosing the perfect venue for your next event, from accessibility to sustainability and ambiance. We always consider what our client wants to achieve with their experience and how the venue can enhance that vision.
Post-pandemic more and more people are choosing to stage their events outside of London, and the North East is a strategic option if you are looking to attract Northern audiences and create a unique, accessible, and memorable experience. Satellite events are also growing in popularity, where you might have a main conference in London and then smaller events held in other parts of the UK. This not only helps audience inclusivity, but it can also provide more opportunities and reach for sponsors too.
With so many venues to choose from, we’ve been reflecting on some of our top venues in the region and why we love them…
You can’t beat the views from the foyer of The Glasshouse, and over the years we have loved bringing events to life in this unique cultural space, including the much anticipated annual Atomicon conference and our sustainability roundtable, which brought together our supply chain to discuss how collaboration can help us reach Net Zero. The team at The Glasshouse has worked hard to create a venue that focusses on accessibility, and the gorgeous glass dome and amazing acoustics will definitely wow your delegates.
Chosen for its unique features and accessible city centre location, The Fire Station in Sunderland was the venue for our TechNExt 2024 industry dinner. Business leaders and sector experts gathered in the state-of-the-art auditorium, which boasts world-class acoustics, before enjoying a delicious three-course meal. The rooms are flexible enough that they can adapt to any event, and delegates can enjoy amazing views across Sunderland’s cultural quarter.
The Catalyst Building is a building of national importance. Home to not one but two National Innovation Centres, the National Centre for Ageing and the National Innovation Centre for Data, it is an inspiring venue that provides the perfect backdrop for delegates to have big conversations and think differently. The UK’s National Centre for Ageing is a long-standing client of BeaconHouse Events, and we leapt at the opportunity to support the team in delivering the UK-China healthy ageing exhibition and event, which took place on Chinese New Year at the Catalyst building. The 170-seat theatre is an impressive space, and the team can cater for large conferences or smaller, more intimate events, depending on your brief, with some truly unique collaborative spaces.
When we are designing events, it is important that we choose venues that have a range of different spaces that can adapt to different parts of the agenda or can provide break-out spaces and quiet rooms so everyone feels welcome and included. At the Fredrick Douglas Centre, you’ll find social spaces, lecture theatres, and an auditorium that seats 750 people alongside a 200-seat lecture theatre and a range of smaller rooms and exhibition spaces. Just a 0.5mile walk / 5-minute electric scooter ride from Central Station, the venue is spread over several floors and is a fantastic base for your international delegation.
The Garden Room at the Biscuit Factory, Ouseburn Valley, is one of the newest spaces in the city. This stunning room transports delegates into a tropical plant-filled oasis, inspired by Victorian Winter Gardens. We’re big fans of spaces that give your delegates photo opportunities so they can share their experience long after your event is over, and with a floor, an indoor waterfall, and luxurious chandeliers, this has to be one of the most Instagrammable conference venues in the North East. The Garden Room can seat 120 people for banqueting and receptions for up to 200 people, and it even has an onsite pizza oven. What’s not to love?
Right in the heart of the city centre, The Common Room is a jewel in Newcastle’s crown. The Grade II-listed building combines rooms steeped in North East history with open and accessible spaces that are versatile enough to bring almost any event to life. We love to see the look on our guests’ faces when they see the 39-foot-high stained-glass window in the library room. This space offers an inspirational setting for innovative events, where delegates can be surrounded by stories of the region’s innovative history. This October, we’re excited to be bringing the #CyberFest Community Conference to the The Common Room. CyberNorth will be welcoming speakers and attendees from around the UK, and there couldn’t be a more perfect setting.
Over the last 10 years, we have worked closely with the team at Wylam Brewery to bring a wide range of events to life in this iconic setting, most notably the highly anticipated Dynamo Dinner and the 2023 Opencast Q1 conference. Wylam Brewery provided our delegates with the perfect venue for an evening of creating invaluable connections while enjoying delicious food accompanied by locally sourced beverages, including their own brewed beers. The layout of the venue lends itself to having a prominent stage for keynote speakers and meaningful opportunities for fostering connections and forging new relationships, and we can’t wait to work with the team again to create another unforgettable experience.
Last but not least, we’ve chosen the newly refurbished City Hall in Sunderland. In 2023 City Hall hosted the Main Stage event for TechNExt festival, and the light, welcoming, and easily accessible space certainly added to the overall experience. TechNExt festival was created to bring people together, inspire new ways of thinking, and showcase our region as a world-class hub of tech and innovation. This flexible, modern space gave us a platform for panel events, networking sessions, private rooms for press briefings, and VIP chill-out rooms for our speakers before they took to the stage.
Posted on August 16, 2024