The BCFA Annual Luncheon is the industry event of the year. Held at the Dorchester it provides a wonderful opportunity for our members to celebrate with their clients who include senior representatives from some of the most prestigious companies creating and designing commercial interiors for buildings across the globe.
This sell out event is always very popular, and this year was no exception with guests streaming through the ballroom entrance on Park Lane as soon as the doors were opened, as guests walked through onto the red carpet our friendly Paparazzi photographers snapped away to capture some candid moments.
Once the guests had consumed a very welcome glass of bubbly they were called through to the magnificent and iconic ballroom. The newly elected chairman of the BCFA, Lee Marvin welcomed everyone with the opening speech. Lee reflected on the most recent achievements of the BCFA and ongoing developments, which included the recently launched CPD scheme to support the education of specifiers and designers, the establishment of FIESTA (The Furniture and Interiors Education, Skills and Training Alliance) in which the BCFA has been an instrumental partner and which seeks to address the skills gaps and boost the number of apprentices recruited to our industry. Lee went on to remind both members and clients that the BCFA encourages and insists upon ethical practices from its members; ‘BCFA members want to be recognised as the honest brokers in our industry. To this end, the BCFA Code of Practice makes our position clear; we wish to ensure that clients have total confidence in the ability of BCFA members to fully meet their obligations to their trading partners’.
Following lunch, the Panaz BCFA Lifetime Achievement Award was presented by Mr Tony Attard OBE DL, High Sherriff of Lancashire and CEO of Panaz. This years’ very popular recipient was Peter Keen, Chairman of Hypnos. Peter has been a longstanding influence on our industry as a previous chair of the BCFA, a Master of the Worshipful Company of Furniture Makers he was also President of the Windsor Royal Warrant Holders Association. Currently Peter chairs the southern region fundraising for the WCFM and is a Trustee of the Bucks Community Foundation. In his acceptance speech Peter thanked his family, his team at Hypnos, and the many suppliers and clients over the years as well as Tony and the BCFA team. He also entertained the guests with his reflections on his nearly 50 years in the industry.
At this point the proceedings were interrupted by one of the Dorchester’s Chefs who wanted us to join us in celebrating his last week working in the kitchens at the hotel, his new role and our obvious enjoyment of the superb lunch. It soon became apparent this was a ruse for the operatic talents of Encore Entertainment who went on to wow the room with their stunning renditions of a range of popular operatic numbers, including a serenade to one of our team. Giovanni and co. succeeded in getting everyone to their feet, some on their chairs to join in, concluding with a mad Conga around the ballroom. It was all great fun and a hugely uplifting finale to another superb luncheon.
We hope you can join us next year.
Thank you to our sponsors, their support is essential to the success of this event:
To view all of the photographs from the event, click here and you can also purchase images from 99p each.