TTGmice's weekly round-up of MICE developments outside of Asia-Pacific.
TWA Hotel at JFK Airport opens
New York City’s JFK Airport opened The TWA Hotel, housed in the airport’s restored TWA terminal building; the historic TWA terminal building opened in 1962 and closed in 2001.
The new hotel has 512 guestrooms, as well as a direct connection to JetBlue’s Terminal 5 via the terminal buildings “flight tubes,” a Jet Age design element that was featured in the movie Catch Me if You Can. There is also a fitness centre, rooftop infinity pool, bar and observation deck with views of runway 4 Left / 22 Right, as well as 4,645m2 of event space which includes a 1,390m2 ballroom.
F&B options include The Sunken Lounge cocktail bar; a lounge inside a transformed Lockheed Constellation “Connie” L-1649A aircraft; a 200-seater all-day restaurant by Jean-Georges, The Paris Café; as well as grab-and-go options alongside coffee carts throughout the grounds.
Other Jet Age touches include a series of museum exhibitions on TWA and midcentury modern design curated by the New York Historical Society, a reading room with Herman Miller-designed furniture and Phaidon books, and a Warby Parker Pencil Room, where travellers can use pencils emblazoned with one-liners to fill out custom postcards.
Hamburg to host world’s largest stem cell conference
Hamburg and the CCH – Congress Center Hamburg – have won their bid to host the 2021 annual meeting of the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR).
The largest global gathering of stem cell scientists, ISSCR 2021 is set to bring 4,000 researchers from around the world for the convention. In addition, the venue is scheduled to reopen in 2020.
The successful bid was put together by several groups: the Life Science Nord cluster initiative, Fraunhofer IME ScreeningPort, the Hamburg Ministry for Science, Research and Equality, the Hamburg Convention Bureau and the CCH – Congress Center Hamburg.
ITP announces new partner in Chile
Travel management consortium ITP (International Travel Partnership) has appointed Chile-based Turismo Rays to its corporate travel network.
Rays Group is a travel agency with over 20 years experience in travel and tourism, covering various businesses segments: Corporate, Consolidation, Leisure, Inbound, MI and MICE. It focuses strongly on the large/middle market enterprises sector and counts many global organisations within their customer base.
“The addition of Turismo Rays brings a new dimension to our travel management coverage and capabilities in South America,” said Ian Epps, director of partnership relations at ITP.
“We expect Turismo Rays to add considerable value to our already comprehensive coverage in Latin America with many opportunities for regional as well as worldwide commercial initiatives.”
