After the opening of the new London Office, Great Fridays thought it was high time that we celebrated, so last Friday we held the official launch party in the capital.

We started the night in the office which allowed us to show off our new premises to both clients and our fellow employees who had travelled down from Manchester. Located on Great Portland Street, the office has given Great Fridays a prominent presence in the capital and allows for further expansion of our Experience Design agency.

“The opening of our London office shows our commitment to the client base in the Capital.  It was great to see so many clients come along to celebrate with us and to compliment us on our achievements.  We are extremely lucky to have found such a great strategic location in the heart of the city, and one which the London team can be proud of.  We believe that we have a fantastically talented group of folks in London, so it was imperative that we found the best working environment for them.  This is the first of three office moves this year, and will be followed by a move into our new 5500 square feet Manchester office, and finally our San Francisco move in the Autumn/Winter. Exciting times!” said Matt Farrar and Rob Noble, Founders.

Having given everybody the grand tour it was time to move on to our venue for the night, Aqua Nueva on Regent Street. Thankfully the rain had subsided so we were able to take full advantage of the stunning roof-terrace giving views across central London. With canapés and champagne flowing, the Great Fridays team were able to catch up with clients in a more relaxed manner.

We are really looking forward to our future in London and the expansion of the agency will allow us to continue driving commercial success for our clients across traditional and new media channels.

Our newly formed Strategy Team picked a perfect day to head to Haydock Races to see if their strategy skills could bring them success on the betting front.

One half of our maroon trousered Northern duo, Nico Sarti, started the day in fine fettle by winning the first race, the less said about the other half, Chris Hughes’ betting performance the better, the closest he got was by backing Bold Sir Brian in honour of our Director of Operations, Bryan Sayle.

Nicola Drury, high on confidence after impressing with her grasp of the Italian language earlier on in the day, religiously stuck to the tips she had been given by her horse racing expert contact (the rumours are that he goes by the name of Bernard, this cannot be confirmed).

The final two members of the team, Stacey Birkett and Nick Bazley went for the strategy of low stake, high winnings by backing a number of long shots.

After a brilliant day of sun, beer and horse racing it was back to Manchester to reflect and decide upon the next day out. But for now it’s back to work to create unique consumer experiences.

Last week Rob, Ian, Kat and Guy took time from their hectic schedules creating amazing digital products to instead create some inspirational glass products. You could say it’s in their blood, even winding down involves making things.

The Wiltshire countryside beckoned them to learn all about gathering, tear drops and thermal shock. The goal: create a paperweight and a vessel. Hmm sounds like a nice way to describe whatever lump of molten glass comes out as a result of attempting to create a jug if you ask me.

The art of glass blowing is truly astonishing. Once you’ve figured out the basics of gathering molten glass on the end of a steel rod (without singeing your eyebrows and breaking your arm from the weight of keeping an inch thick pole turning in your fingers constantly) you’ve then got to make it into something symmetrical and perfectly formed. We’re still waiting to see the results of our efforts  (it takes time for glass to cool down) but we’ll be sure to share our efforts with you just as soon as we can. In the meantime we’re pretty sure that they’re all phenomenal.

Right back to creating amazing digital products.

As the XD team loved their last team day out so much, they decided it was time for another one! This time they were treated to a ‘Cocktail masterclass’, and pitted their pouring, mixing, and shaking skills against one another.

The night started off as it meant to go on with a shot of ice cold strawberry vodka, followed by a glass of bucks fizz. They then teamed up to make the cocktails themselves, ranging from the classic Mojito, to the milkshake mudslide!

There were loads of laughs when it came round to the team games, with Matt Farrar and Phil Salt going head to head with Mark Sugdon and John Atkinson to re-create the best cocktail. Matt and Phil were not successful in their endeavors however, and had to drink a shot of chili vodka as the penalty, but it was worth it to see the looks on their faces.

Luckily, Nicola Owen, Gary Butcher and Allan Weir all escaped the fiery vodka shots, and stuck to sampling the delicious cocktails on offer. They just have to resist the temptation of telling the bar staff how they should be doing it in the future!

It came to that time of year again for Great Fridays to share some festive fun with our annual Christmas greeting. This year we set ourselves the challenge of creating a winter wonderland with handmade, paper cut-out illustrations. Unlike month long productions of the biggest blockbusters, our little masterpiece was made quicker than you can shout “Action!” as we hatched a plan and swiftly moved into production. Designer Mathew Skitt made other members of the team anxious with his knife cutting skills, whilst Rowan Cavanagh’s steady hand rose to the challenge of building the scene with ease.

After hours of preparation the cast gathered together for rehearsal. With our very own Spielberg, Head Creative Ricky Phoolka, sitting in the director’s chair, it was time to get the film rolling. Interest from around the office grew quickly, as did the pressure to perform with Nick Bazley, slightly amusingly falling victim to stage fright early on.

After a few takes both cast and crew soon hit their stride for the big scene, with everything coming together for the key shot of Santa flying through the clouds accompanied by Joe Whelan’s specially written music adding to the magic. Upon filming some close up shots, Ricky could confidently claim “It’s a wrap!”

It was a great team effort and we hope you enjoyed watching as much as we did making it. We’ll see you at the Oscars!

To watch the video click here.

We would like to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

Some of our creatives got together here in the office, to produce a little Christmas treat for you all to get into the festive mood.

We hope you enjoy it!

This weekend the DS and XD teams celebrated the 3^rd birthday of Great Fridays with our annual Christmas party. This year the celebrations were taken up a notch and the team descended on Windermere in the Lake District for a fun filled day of entertainment organised by our fabulous Front of House, Jannine Craggs.

After taking in the beautiful views from our hotel rooms, we got on to the serious business of virtual horse racing. With a starting pot of £500 for each person, everyone bet big from the start but it wasn’t until the final virtual pig race that the overall winner was clear, and our accounts assistant Lisa Knox-Brown claimed the prize.

At the champagne reception, the secret santa presents were handed out and then it was on to dinner after a rousing speech from Mark Carrington who could not be taken off the mic. After dinner, it was time to throw some shapes on the dance floor, an activity which was fully embraced by all team members.

One of the many highlights of the night was John Atkinson’s performance of a few festive favourites and his very own critically acclaimed number ‘The Black Dog’. As the night was still young the Great Friday’s team were able to sample Windermere’s finest nightlife with a trip to the Wheelhouse, where the dancing continued until the wee hours of the morning, the less said about that, the better, although a special mention needs to go to Bryan Sayle for his re-enactment of the lift from Dirty Dancing and Co-founder Matt Farrar’s performance on the pole.

A great time was had by all and a big thank you needs to go out to Jannine, Matt and Rob for organising such a brilliant weekend.

Great Fridays Producer, Dean Evans and wife Verity welcomed twins Charlie and Audrey into their family on Saturday 5^th November. Audrey Ann Evans arrived first at 9pm weighing 5.6 lbs, closely followed by Charles Henry Evans at 9:05pm weighing 6.6 ½ lbs. Verity and babies are doing really well with Dean describing them as ‘unbelievable’. All the family are well and accounted for back at home now and Dean and Verity are enjoying spending time with the babies.

As you can see Audrey and Charlie are already naturals in front of the camera.

Congratulations again from everybody at Great Fridays, we can’t wait to meet them!

It was all go in the office last week.

With the news that the Farrar five are now six – with our co-founder Matt Farrar and wife Victoria welcoming baby Madeleine Eve into the world at 5.17am – it was then the turn of Producer Dean Evans and wife, Verity. Dean and Verity welcomed twins Charlie and Audrey into the family on Saturday night.

All the staff at Great Fridays would like to wish Victoria and Matt; Verity and Dean our warmest congratulations. Everyone’s very excited to meet the new additions! We’ll post some pictures as soon as they arrive.