Prague - 1
There was a really, really hilarious moment at this year's annual Luxury Bloc, held as always in Prague. This is the seventh annual event and, is it possible to say it? It was better than ever. Okay. The hilarity? Well, second night of the three-night event was the gala dinner this year at Zofin Palace, on an island in the Vitava River: the Palace, named for the mother of Emperor Franz Joseph I, Archduchess Sophie - Žofie in Czech – had opened with a ball in 1837 and later Franz Liszt, Hector Berlioz, Richard Wagner and Pyotr Tchaikovsky played there.
It’s now Government owned, and managed by the Zátiší Group, who catered the whole Luxury Bloc, eve ongoing coffees and snack during meetings. Zátiší Group is run by its founder, Sanjeev Suri, an Indian-born restaurateur, entrepreneur and philanthropist, who supports charitable and educational causes through the Suri Foundation (he was originally trained, by the way, by Oberoi back in India). Dinner that night, served plated – it was open seating = was smoked salmon, veal fillet, and a divine bitter orange chocolate cake, with a choice of two Italian wines, a Gavi and a Primitivo DOC. Towards the end of the meal, one of the servers dropped a tray of cutlery, and instead of an embarrassment, it turned into an impromptu dance. It was marvellous. See the photo above. The servers all started dancing, and it got more and more excited as they brought out pots and pans from the kitchen and made it into a really excellent show. It was honestly better than the classical dancers that we'd had previously during the evening.
The hospitality side of Luxury Bloc is always important because of the networking. The first night was held in the Empire Hall, a glamorous Art Deco-style events venue – modern but looks established - within the historic Slovanský dům complex, whose origins date to the 17th century. The complex that now also includes a cinema that is a seven-minute walk through an inner cobbled courtyard from the main host hotel Andaz, and across the road another host hotel, the Julius, owned by Austria's Julius Meinl Living. The first night, Zátiší Group did a buffet in Empire Hall, which included a burrata bar, a bao bun show, and pork and turkey carvery. The third night, as always, was a let-your-hair-down, go upstairs or go downstairs, off-site at the all-red Buddha Bar, about ten minutes' walk away from Andaz.
But the main reason for about 200 travel enthusiasts and travel professionals to be in Prague was to meet equal numbers of exhibitors and hosted buyers were there to do business. Buyers, top travel advisors, are not re-invited unless they can prove to organiser Gabriela Markova that they put at least seven bookings into exhibitors from last year's show. The exhibitors came from all over the world, including Vienna’s Mandarin Oriental, Dubai’s Atlantis Royal, Ras Al Khaimah’s forthcoming Wynn Marjan Island, Cheli & Peacock Safaris from Kenya, and DMCs Mark Telio, Vancouver, and Stephanie d’Aboville, Paris. The travel advisors came from the Central and Eastern Europe bloc, the Baltics vertically south to the Mediterranean.
