Summer Dinner is a Sell Out

Kate Jones, Tarmac World

Rod Sweet, Construction Manager

The IBP annual Summer Dinner was, for the second year running, held at a prestige London venue - Somerset House - and proved to be another outstanding success.

The event was a sell-out and indeed a 20-strong waiting list built up which augers well for 2006. Guest Speaker at the dinner was John Sorrell, Chairman of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) who also presented the awards for Subscription Magazine of the Year and In House Magazine of the Year. (See picture).

Magazine of the Year Awards chairman, Peter Murray, Chairman of Wordsearch, which specialises in explaining the importance of architecture to the public at large, announced that the award for Subscription Magazine of the Year went to the RIBA Journal which is circulated to 29,300 members of the Royal Institute of British Architects. He said: "The journal has run several powerful stories during the year and has developed innovative promotional projects such as commissioning a film of the RIBA Gold Medallist Award."

"The judges praised the quality of the editorial and the design of the main part of the magazine, although they had slight reservations about the compartmentalisation of the RIBA news sections. They felt that the quality of the editorial competed well with other commercial magazines in the marketplace and praised its independent viewpoint."

Peter Murray said the judges also viewed ''Construction Manager'' as a close runner-up to the RIBA Journal. "Without the benefits of the visual resources available to the winner, this magazine was bold and exciting. They described it as an ''engaging magazine'' which did not hold back on editorial issues."

The ''In House Magazine of the Year'' award went to ''Tarmac World'' which is circulated to 12,000 employees and pensioners of Tarmac. It is edited by the Internal communications office and produced by an external agency.

Tarmac World readership surveys showed that 88 per cent of the recipients read all or most of the magazine. "The judges liked its energy, its variety and its active regional correspondents and they felt it was an easy read," concluded Murray.