Group size: 630
Venue: Chu Van An Secondary School in Hanoi
Brief & Challenges:
A leading software company required a cultural experience including off-site gala events that could cater to all delegates in a single space, complete with a stage for entertainment and awards. In a city of limited options for a group of this size, it was to eventuate into the largest off-site international gala event ever put together in Hanoi. Due to size limitations, the traditional Hanoi venues of the Opera House, Temple of Literature and the History Museum could not be considered. After many discussions and meetings with the Ministry of Education, the high school Chu Van An was selected. This is one of the oldest institutions in Indochina and met the historical elements requested by the client.
Execution:
The expansive school courtyard was transformed into an ‘Indochine’ period setting with 65 tables lined by Parisian style street lamps. The set up was executed at night to avoid disrupting school studies, which placed additional pressure on suppliers and our staff of 300 people. All AV was brought in from Australia and Thailand with a custom-made stage resplendent in Vietnamese art built to host the wide variety of entertainment taking place over the evening, including fire artists and girls in traditional white ‘ao dai’, cycling around the tables with bread baskets.
A blank canvas 6 metres high was fixed on both sides of the stage where local Hanoi artists painted typical Vietnamese scenes during the course of the evening. At the end the canvas was cut up and placed into picture frames as souvenirs for delegates.
Client Feedback:
The client was thrilled with the event, commenting, “it was a tremendous effort to pull off an event of such scale and complexity in a very challenging environment”, and that the entertainment was “a highly intimate cultural experience for all the guests.”
