Inside the London hotel built to handle everything from board meetings to 1,350 guests

HiltonLondon Metropole has 35 event spaces spread across more than 5,000 square metres, combining vast ballrooms with private meeting rooms, hybrid facilities and a 23rd floor space overlooking the capital.

London is hardly short of places to hold a meeting. Finding somewhere capable of accommodating an eight person discussion one day and a 1,350 guest conference the next is rather more difficult.

That breadth is central to the events business at Hilton London Metropole, where 35 spaces occupy 5,357 square metres of the hotel near Edgware Road.

Long associated with large conferences, the hotel has increasingly built its events operation around flexibility. Its largest rooms can accommodate four figure audiences, while elsewhere there are meeting rooms for a few dozen people, spaces for private dinners and launches, and dedicated facilities for events split between physical and remote audiences.

For organisers, the attraction is not simply size. It is having enough different spaces within one building to move between the various stages of an event without sending delegates elsewhere.

From eight people to 1,350

At the largest end of the hotel are the Richmond and Kensington Suites. Each covers 1,062 square metres and can accommodate as many as 1,350 people in a theatre arrangement.

Richmond can also be separated into six breakout spaces, allowing a large conference to divide into smaller sessions without leaving the main events area.

The infrastructure behind the rooms has been designed with similarly substantial productions in mind. A goods lift with direct street access is large enough to carry a car, while five dedicated guest lifts serve the events operation, including one reserved for the event floors.

For events that do not require a full ballroom, the 724 square metre Admiral Suite can be divided into two, allowing conference and catering areas to operate separately. It can also be combined with the adjoining GMT Suite and Mezzanine level for events requiring greater privacy or control over the surrounding spaces.

GMT itself accommodates up to 200 guests and can be divided into three rooms, with its own foyer providing somewhere for networking and drinks receptions away from the principal meeting.

The smaller end of the scale

The sheer size of the hotel could easily obscure the other side of its events business.

Twelve Mezzanine Meeting Rooms cater for between 20 and 150 delegates in different configurations, while the Hoxton Lounge provides a more informal environment for gatherings of up to ten.

Three purpose built Hybrid Meeting Rooms have permanently installed audiovisual equipment for events involving both remote and physically present participants. Tinted windows provide additional privacy.

“Event planners increasingly need more than capacity,” said Kelly Shrives Wrist, general manager at Hilton London Metropole. “They want spaces that can adapt as an event develops, from plenary sessions and breakouts to private dinners, hybrid meetings and overnight stays.

“Having such a broad range of spaces under one roof allows us to build the venue around the event, rather than asking organisers to compromise their plans.”

Dinner with London as the backdrop

The most visually distinctive option is found considerably higher up.

Room 23 sits on the hotel's 23rd floor, looking across the London skyline. The contemporary space accommodates up to 150 guests and is intended for private dinners, receptions and product launches.

It provides something quite different from the conventional conference rooms below, particularly for companies seeking a space where the surroundings form part of the event itself.

That ability to move from large formal conference spaces to dinners and receptions within the same property becomes particularly useful for events running over several days.

Hilton London Metropole has 1,100 bedrooms, ranging from executive rooms and suites to accessible accommodation and connecting family rooms. Group allocations and event rates can be arranged depending on availability and booking terms.

Keeping accommodation, meetings, catering and evening events within one building also removes one of the less glamorous complications of the conference circuit: transporting hundreds of people around London between different venues.

Location still matters

For all the attention given to what happens inside an events hotel, its usefulness is inevitably determined partly by how easily people can reach it.

Hilton London Metropole is close to Edgware Road Underground station and less than a mile from Paddington. For international delegates arriving through Heathrow, the Heathrow Express connects the airport with Paddington.

The hotel's culinary operation can provide everything from refreshments and canapés to buffets, private dinners and large gala meals, with menus adapted for dietary, cultural and allergen requirements.

Technical support is similarly scalable, covering production, sound, lighting, connectivity and streaming depending on the room and type of event.

There are also attempts to reduce the environmental impact of an operation of this size. The hotel says its electricity is generated from UK offshore wind farms, while staff uniforms incorporate recycled plastic bottles. Its restaurants source 90 per cent of their ingredients from within 100 miles of the property.

None of those individual elements is particularly unusual in London's competitive events market. What distinguishes HiltonLondon Metropole is their concentration.

A board meeting for eight, a hybrid presentation, a private dinner overlooking London and a conference for more than a thousand people are very different propositions. Here, they can all take place under the same roof.