Sustainability has been a key part of the Barbican’s success story over the last two weeks with a win at the London Venue and Catering Awards, followed by the hosting of the Sustainable Events Show and the announcement of a major exhibition.
On Friday 19 November, the Barbican won the Sustainability Award at the London Venue and Catering Awards, beating off stiff competition from other well-known venues. In particular, the judges recognised the Barbican’s wide-ranging activities on sustainability, going beyond just the environment to include working with local communities and staff.
On Thursday 25 November, the Barbican hosted more than 800 attendees at the inaugural Sustainable Events Show, which included more than 50 exhibitors and 30 speakers from across the events industry.
On Tuesday 30 November, Barbican International Enterprises announced Our Time on Earth – a major exhibition opening in May 2022 celebrating the power of global creativity to transform the conversation around the climate emergency. Through art, design, science, music and philosophy, the exhibition presents a range of radical visions for the future of all species.
Jackie Boughton, Barbican Head of Events commented: “I am so proud of my whole team this week. Just a few weeks after the conclusion of COP 26, we are excited that our sustainability efforts to date have been recognised by peers and industry experts. Winning this award goes beyond just our business events department to incorporate the whole of the Barbican’s wider team, particularly those working tirelessly to improve every element of our infrastructure and facilities. We recognise we’ve much further to go, but we’re dedicated to finding more ways to address our environmental impact and achieve our target of reducing carbon emissions from our own operations to net zero by 2027.”
Sustainable Event Show organiser, Wesley Mendy, backed this up by saying: “What better place to hold our inaugural show, just days after the venue was crowned the best in the business by an industry leading panel of judges. The Barbican supported us throughout the entire organisation of a carbon-neutral event – creating a real-life demonstration of their award-winning capabilities.”
About Barbican Business Events
The Barbican is one of the world’s leading conference and international arts venues. Located in the City of London, it is capable of holding meetings from 10-2,000 delegates in its fully equipped concert hall, theatres, conference suites and boardrooms. Barbican Business Events brings together the venue’s expertise in the arts and corporate meetings.
Built as part of London’s Barbican development and officially opened in March 1982 by HM Queen Elizabeth, unlike many other venues, Barbican was specifically built with the dual purpose of holding conferences and arts events presenting a diverse range of art, music, theatre, dance, film and creative learning.
The Barbican’s Business Events team contributes to the venue’s future success. To make the most of the Barbican’s rich culture and heritage, Barbican Business Events was created to bring together their expertise in three very different areas – the arts, creative learning and corporate business. This approach to corporate events is based on stronger, more in-depth partnerships with their artistic, creative learning and development teams in order to bring more creativity and rich content to events.
The Barbican provides a vibrant and inspiring venue for corporate events, conferences, meetings and entertainment. The venue is capable of holding meetings from 10-2,000 delegates in spaces including a concert hall, theatres, a boardroom and conference suites that can accommodate 10-170 delegates and can be adjusted using sound proofed sliding. As part of its wider investment strategy, the Barbican spent £2.2m on a significant refurbishment throughout the Centre in the summer of 2016 including its Frobisher rooms and Level 4. The focus of the Frobisher refurbishment is designed to create an even stronger connection between the Centre’s main conference and meeting facilities and its arts spaces.
About the Barbican
A world-class arts and learning organisation, the Barbican pushes the boundaries of all major art forms including dance, film, music, theatre and visual arts. Its creative learning programme further underpins everything it does. Over a million people attend events annually, hundreds of artists and performers are featured, and more than 300 staff work onsite. The architecturally renowned centre opened in 1982 and comprises the Barbican Hall, the Barbican Theatre, The Pit, Cinemas 1, 2 and 3, Barbican Art Gallery, a second gallery The Curve, public spaces, a library, the Lakeside Terrace, a glasshouse conservatory, conference facilities and three restaurants. The City of London Corporation is the founder and principal funder of the Barbican Centre.
