STRICTLY BALLROOM AS HOGAN LOVELLS TAKES TO THE DANCEFLOOR
PALE winter skin was smothered in fake tan and suits were replaced by sequins. Think The Only Way is Essex meets Strictly Come Dancing and you’re halfway to picturing the spectacle that was Hogan Lovells’ ballroom dancing contest.
There is no record of what the law firm’s clients made of it all, but the Legally Ballroom event was such “good fun” that co-ordinator Richard Tyler – the energy partner with two left feet – found he had important business in Ankara to attend to on the night in question.
“But fortunately there were enough people happy and keen to take part,” Tyler told The Capitalist on his return from northern Turkey. Fifteen couples from the firm’s London office, in fact, who had given up their Wednesday evenings for ten weeks in the run-up to learning the mambo, paso doble, jive and waltz from professional dancers.
Laurence Dace and Corinne McPartland were judged the winning Hogan Lovells pair by former England footballer Geoff Thomas, Hogan Lovells business development manager Errol Donald and Clara Evans from Caterham Dance School. Action Against Hunger split the £9,000 raised by the charity event with Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research.
BREAKING THE ICE
HOW TO make friends and influence people: conduct a naked phone chat with Five Live at the Labour Party Conference and then dine out on the story for the next few months.
Well, it seems to be working for John Longworth, the new director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, who was called for his live interview just as he emerged from taking a shower in his Liverpool hotel bedroom. Apparently, the tale has proved something of an icebreaker as Longworth settles into the role.
LLOYDS RESHUFFLE
WANTED: a media relations manager, a senior media relations manager and a media relations officer. Anyone would think there was some sort of communications crisis at the recruiting bank in question.
But no, says Matt Young, group corporate affairs director at Lloyds Banking Group, the PR hiring spree is simply about “reorganising what we had before” as part of an internal comms restructure dating back to Lloyds’ strategic review in June.
It is certainly not related to “anything that has happened in the last three weeks”, said Young firmly, following Lloyds’ crisis manoeuvres after stressed-out chief executive Antonio Horta-Osorio decided to take an extended break. Just so that’s clear.
DIAMOND AUCTION
IF IT’S good enough to appear in the December issue of Vogue, it’s good enough for the readers of City A.M., says Laura Young, who brings you this Peter Lindbergh portrait of model Stella Tennant wearing an 18-carat yellow and white gold diamond necklace (pictured above).
The pendant is being auctioned off on Wednesday by Edinburgh auctioneers Lyon & Turnbull to raise funds for the Teapot Trust, a charity that provides art therapy for children with life-limiting diseases in Edinburgh and Glasgow. For details on how to bid, email laura@johnctaylor.com