The Wedding Industry Awards

The Wedding Industry Awards took place on Wednesday 18th of January and both Zoe and I attended as representatives for the UK Academy of Wedding and Event Planning (UKAWEP) and what a night it was. The venue, Cafe de Paris, was fantastic and was opulent and visually appealing with a chandelier hanging from the ceiling and cozy booths with velvet interior around the dance floor. It had a real Moulin Rouge feel to it which thrilled me as I have just come back from a mini New Year break in Paris, so this was very apt for me.

The event itself seemed to go off without a hitch and was very well organised. We were welcomed by staff at the top of the stairs and pointed in the right direction whereupon we were served a glass of champagne. As this was a cocktail event with canapes being served throughout the evening there was much mingling and networking going on as the elite of the wedding world came together to celebrate the industry.

As there were Regional Winners from each category in attendance the dance floor area had been set up in regions to allow easy networking between those that knew each other whilst the close proximity to other regions allowed for new friendships to be formed.

The room was buzzing by the time Damian Bailey, the man behind the awards, took to the stage to start the formalities of the evening. Each category was introduced by Sarah Hewson, Sky News Presenter, who looked stunning in a green cocktail dress and gave us a behind the scenes glimpse of her life as a Royal Wedding Correspondent.

The quality of the entries for each category was extremely high and in some cases led to the judges awarding a ‘Highly Commended’ to entrants in some of the categories. Of course the category we were most interested in was that of Best Independent Wedding Planner, as this is the area we hope to see one of our students in next year. This honour was taken out by the very talented Jane Riddell and her company Planned for Perfection. We are hoping to do an interview with Jane over the next week and talk to her about her award and what she feels it takes to be a successful planner.

Another category that was of interest was that of Best Wedding Coordinator within a Venue and this award went to Michele Jetzer of Riverstation and we would like to extend our congratulations to Michele as well.

As I said it was a wonderful evening and we would like to congratulate Damian and his team on a fantastic effort for the first in what we hope will be many more Wedding Industry Awards evenings. We are looking forward to next year and for those of you looking to enter the 2013 Awards click here to be kept up to date on what is happening. To finish things off here is a happy snap of Zoe and I having fun at the Awards!