Ildhafn Council meeting: 25th July 2010
Minutes taken by Shannon Wanty.
Present: Katherine Davies (Seneschal), Shannon Wanty (A&S Officer), Patrick Bowman (Herald),
Angela Wells (Chatelaine), David Robb (Chronicler)
Apologies: Gary, Vanessa, Nicola, Matt, Bea, Adrian, Phil
Absent: Everyone else.
Start Time: 7.36pm
Officer Reports received via email: A&S, Chronicler, Chateleine, Herald, Harbour
Master, Rapier Marshall, Marshall
Past events:
Midwinter Coronation: Angela tabled the final budget at the event. A&S competition cost (bells
& ribbons) comes out of the event cost which no-one knew beforehand – came in at $11. Site ended
up costing slightly less than budgeted because they came back to us asking less so Ange accepted
that. Petrol cost more as only $1 was budgetted – not only moving stuff from Quartermaster to site
and back but also running around on the day, also the van cost more compared to a car and went
from having it for two days to having it for three days. Most of the profit came from late event
bookings. Looks like 50 was the right breakeven for this event. Ange or Katherine will go back and
check the original bid to see what projected profit was for different numbers.
Good stuff: Maintaining regular contact with sites and visiting just before the event was important
and helpful (especially with things like number of chairs and tables etc). Van rental. Steward &
Deputy Steward catch up ahead of time was good. Google documents worked really well. Timed
chores worked really well, helped make sure people weren’t overworked. Having someone who has
the chores list and can make sure people are sticking to it is helpful. Dedicated oil lamp filler, and
candles only on high table, games on the table were good. Cornwall Park worked really well and the
people were easy to deal with. Banners looked pretty.
Didn’t work so well: No equipment list for Sunday. Organised times for Heralds and Crown to get
together would have helped as a “just in case”. Forgot about thinking about food equipment for
Sunday, but worked out okay. Focus was mostly on the Saturday for all of the Stewarding team.
In the future: Project meetings independent of Council, actually talk through what’s happening,
timeline of the event etc. Timing of stuff was difficult with regards to communicating with the
Crown – encouraging some sort of movement within Kingdom to enable people to make a decision
would be good.
Venues were quite good – would have been nice to have one venue for the Saturday, but as the new
one required so little to be done it made it easy. Travelling between sites seemed to be easy enough
for most people. People appeared to enjoy the downtime between court and feast, enabled them to
socialise and relax.
Having a dedicated van driver would have been helpful as part of the stewarding team.
Using St Aidan’s again would be good if we could get in there the night before and do some set
up ahead of time. This would have made a huge difference to speed and stress levels. Proximity
of kitchen & feast during court possibly an issue. Designated feast herald and court herald worked
well. Some way of barring the hall so that the populace cannot get into the hall ahead of time would
make it less stressful set up wise – also makes a better effect when people enter.
Three crews: Food prep, plating and service rather than two teams of food prep/plating and service.
Having some sort of portable curtain system where we can divide off a section of a hall to use as
a plating area would be good. Clearer announcement at the start of the feast of how many courses
there are and what serving style it is in – helps people to pace themselves, and to know what’s
happening.
Upcoming Events:
St Catherine’s Faire: Collegium Day and Fighting Day sounds nice, but less good for families
from Cluain especially since Coronation was less family-friendly.
Fencing Tourney: Still happening 1st of August. Patrick has heard from one heavy fighters. He will
inquire of the fencers who is planning on attending.
Other business:
Standards: Cluain has asked re using these at St John’s – probably no problem with this.
Profit from Coronation: Look at what we want to spend some of this on at next Council meeting,
and how much we want to put in the bank.
2012: What type of event do we want to run as the next big one?
Meeting closed 8.50pm