Medway City Of Culture 2025

Please Note:
You will receive a link to join the webinar the day before the event via email, please also check your junk folder for this.

This is the year Medway will send in their bid to be UK City of Culture in 2025. The bid is being shaped by people across Medway’s towns, villages and peninsula, and everyone no matter their age or background are invited to join in and get involved in a year-long cultural programme that will shine a light on Medway’s personality and stories.

At this event, you hear from the Medway City of Culture Board of Trustees regarding their plans for the bid and how local businesses can get involved and show support. You will also hear what winning the City Of Culture Bid will mean to small businesses, Kent tourism and visitor economy.

Host;
Jo James OBE, CEO at Kent Invicta Chamber of Commerce

Guest Speakers;

• Imogen Robertson, Medway’s Bid Director
• Dominic Gibbons, Managing Director at Wykeland Group
• Deirdre Wells, CEO of Visit Kent and co-chair of the Medway 2025 Trustees Board
• Deborah Turner, Federation of Small Businesses for the South East
• Simon Cook – Principal at Mid Kent College, Place Board Chair and Medway 2025 Trustee
• David Ward and Katie Pickett– Co-chairs of the Medway 2025 Business Engagement Group

To find out more about the City Of Culture Bid, click here.

Imogen Robertson is Bid Director for Medway’s 2025 UK City of Culture bid.

She hails from Medway and has worked in theatre and the arts as a producer and general manager. Imogen’s career has spanned international, large-scale immersive productions including Olivier Award nominated smash-hit ‘Alice’s Adventures Underground’ as well as UK touring and outdoor shows and corporate collaborations for innovative theatre company Les Enfants Terribles and sister company Les Petits.

She has produced work for The National Trust, Madame Tussauds, Pussy Riot, Toyota and Stella Artois.

Imogen joined Medway’s 2025 UK City of Culture bid from her role as Executive Producer (Public Engagement and Learning) for Imperial War Museums (IWM London, IWM North, IWM Duxford, HMS Belfast and Churchill War Rooms).

Dominic Gibbons is the Managing Director of the Wykeland Group, a property development and investment company based in Hull.  Wykeland has a £500m development programme in the Yorkshire and Humber region from business space to town and city centre regeneration schemes.

One of their key projects is the Fruit Market in Hull where a once derelict part of the city is now a thriving urban village with tech co-working space, artist studios, new residential, an amphitheatre over a listed dry dock and a vibrant independent retail and leisure offering.

The mantra of the business over the last 10 years has been physical regeneration does not happen without cultural and social regeneration.  Wykeland was a major sponsor of Hull’s 2017 City of Culture and has supported numerous cultural organisations in the region over the last decade.

Deirdre Wells OBE was appointed as CEO of Visit Kent in September 2018.  Deirdre is also CEO of Go to Places, an

organisation created by the company, to deliver services to partners outside, and in partnership with Kent, including setting up the new Destination Management Organisation, Visit Hertfordshire, the Big Weekend and a number of national tourism projects under the Government’s Discover England Fund.

Prior to her appointment to Visit Kent, Deirdre was Chief Executive of UKinbound, representing nearly 400 UK inbound tourism businesses.  Deirdre joined UKinbound following 20 years in Government at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport working on a variety of high-profile projects including the Millennium Dome, Liverpool Capital of Culture 2008 and the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games, and latterly as Head of Tourism.

Deirdre is Chair of English Tourism Week and sits on the Board of the Tourism Society and the Tourism Alliance.

Deborah Turner is the owner of Deborah Turner Ltd, she is a Chartered Surveyor providing property asset management advice to clients, currently working mainly for local authorities, assisting them to make best use of their property assets. Deborah also has a passion project, You Image Consultancy, which provides personal image advice, helping you to raising your profile and become more visible.

Deborah is passionate about small businesses and is the South East Policy Lead for the Federation of Small Businesses and their National Policy Lead for Women in Enterprise.

Deborah regularly hosts events and forums to assist small businesses and engage regularly with the local business community. She is the co-founder of Breakthrough Women, a not-for-profit organisation, hosting events focused for women at work who want to meet likeminded women and hear from real role models.

During her career she has worked as a property professional in Kent and Medway, having always lived in Medway, went to school in Medway and her business is now home based in Medway.

Deborah has worked on regeneration projects, new community building projects, served as a school governor and worked closely with Medway Council on property projects. She has a good network of business connections and excellent local contacts.

Simon Cook is the principal and CEO at MidKent College.

Leaving school at 16 to become an Apprentice Chef gave Simon brilliant opportunities to work in Michelin star restaurants in London and Germany. His passion for cooking saw him work for an extended period in South Africa, before returning to the UK to work at a 5-star hotel in Hampshire.

He began teaching in 2002 in Buckinghamshire, and progressed to leadership roles in Somerset and Cornwall before settling in Kent in 2013.

In 2016 he was appointed Principal and CEO of MidKent College. Simon is driven by a passion for empowering people to change their lives and communities through education.

David Ward is a senior security consultant who has worked at every level of security over many of the security disciplines for over 25 years.

In 2000, he co-founded Ward Security a company which under his direction, grew to become one of the leading security company’s in the UK with a £45m turnover, employing over 1000 security personnel.

He left his Chief Executive position in the business in 2021 to establish DWA Associates, a consultancy that specialises in working with businesses at an international level to provide risk management consultancy and security advice.

David is very passionate about serving and helping businesses in Kent and has been a Kent Ambassador for many years.  He is also Chair of the Business Guild for Rochester Cathedral as well as a Trustee.

Finally, he is the co-founder of charity Abigails Footsteps which was set up by David and his wife in loving memory of their daughter Abigail who was stillborn in 2010.  The charity works with midwives and care staff to improve bereavement training and support given to parents and provides hospitals with equipment and counselling for bereaved families.

Zoom Security:

• Be aware of what is on display in the background if connecting to Zoom from your home.
• Be aware of anything gives away where you live.
• Be aware of having confidential documents on display within the camera shot.
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• Never ‘write’/ ‘say’ anything in chat or a ‘room’ you wouldn’t say in an email.