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Jonathan Grosvenor

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  3. Jonathan Grosvenor
01865 582350
clerk@accountantslivery.org

35 Ascot Way, Bicester, Oxfordshire, OX26 1AG

Events from this organiser
Today

Two “Flights” on the London Eye

London Eye Riverside Building +1 more

The London Eye is the iconic ferris wheel on the south bank of the Thames, just opposite the Palace of Westminster. From the top, those travelling in the enclosed gondolas can see all across London and, on a clear day, out beyond the M25. Now in its 25th year of operation, those who take one of the "flights" as they are styled, report that the amazing view during daylight hours is starkly different from what it looks like, gazing down on our nation's capital, all lit up at night. To test this and enjoy that contrast, the Master is leading a party of ten Members and guests on a 6.15pm flight, to see London laid out before them in daylight. Then, our party will repair to a local restaurant for a restorative supper, before returning for the 8.15pm flight, which will begin as dusk falls, enabling everyone to enjoy the full night-time experience. The price of £109 includes both flights, and a light supper with wine, and one of the official souvenir brochures. Dress is casual, with an emphasis on wrapping up reasonably warm, for what may well be a slight evening chill.

Get Tickets £109.00 8 tickets left

St George’s Day Banquet with the RSSG

Drapers' Hall Throgmorton Avenue, London

The Royal Society of St George (aka The RSSG) is a global British patriotic society, and has one of its most active branches in the City of London. Routinely chaired by former Lord Mayors, Sheriffs and other senior figures from the Corporation, it effectively functions like a Livery Company. The highlight of the RSSG's annual social round is, perhaps inevitably, a massive Banquet on St George's Day. The event has been described by many as "The last night of the Proms with a swanky Banquet thrown in", and we periodically send a party along to join in - during PM John Cardnell's year, over 40 members and their guests went along and had a great time. This year, the RSSG has again invited us to join them and as the Spring Dinner is already sold out, it seemed a great idea to accept. So the Master and Mistress will lead our party and it is hoped that you and any guests can come along too, enjoy the four-course, roast-beef-centred-dinner, with wines, coffee and chocs etc, and then wave your flags with the best of them during the sing song. Tickets cost £179 each, dress is black tie, and rather encouragingly, the drinks reception, which starts at 6.30pm, lasts a whole hour!

Get Tickets £179.00 18 tickets left

Visit to Highgate Cemetery and Supper

Highgate Cemetery Swain's Lane, London, United Kingdom

The world-famous Highgate Cemetery, with its iconic tombs (Karl Marx etc) was originally opened in 1839, as part of a commercial venture to provide seven large, modern cemeteries, round the edge of central London. The inner-city cemeteries, mostly graveyards attached to churches, had long been unable to cope with the number of burials and "The Magnificent Seven" were intended to solve this problem, and to turn a profit at the same time. Highgate occupies a spectacular south-facing hillside site on Highgate Hill. Like the other six, it soon became a fashionable place for burials and the Victorian attitude to death and its presentation led to the creation of a wealth of Gothic tombs, buildings and catacombs. Sadly, the cemetery was not well run and fell into such dire financial straits in the Mid-20th Century that most of the staff, including the gardeners were laid off, and it was left unguarded and so was much vandalised. Over decades, the grounds became increasingly overgrown and today they are full of trees, shrubbery, and wildflowers, as well as being a haven for birds and small animals, such as foxes. In 1975, Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust bought the freehold, and order is steadily being restored to what has, despite its troubled history, remained a working cemetery throughout. With its sinuous paths winding up a steep wooded hill and ivy-clad monuments, Highgate Cemetery is a secluded, funerary landscape at its most evocative. We will have a hour's private tour of the Western Cemetery (considered by those who have visited both, to be much the more interesting), after the gates have shut to the public for the day. We will be shown all the key sites there, before slipping across the road to visit Karl Marx's tomb and a few other items on the Eastern...

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Get Tickets £59.00 1 ticket left

Livery Tour and Dinner on SS Great Britain – Sold Out

SS Great Britain Great Western Dockyard, Gas Ferry Rd, Bristol

The SS Great Britain is the world’s first great ocean liner and when launched in 1843 she was called ‘the greatest experiment since the creation’. After 40 years as a passenger ship and then a cargo ship, she was severely damaged off Cape Horn and left to rot in the Falkland Islands until 1970, when she was re-floated and bought back to Bristol, where a charity refurbished her and cares for the ship and Brunel’s collections. Brunel’s ship is now Bristol’s number one tourist attraction and has been lovingly restored to her original glory, exactly as she would have been ready for her maiden voyage. She sits in a dry dock on a glass ‘sea’ and dominates Bristol’s historic waterfront. This is a very rare opportunity to dine on the this world-famous ship, as London's Liveries, (led by the Engineers, naturally!), have her for our exclusive use that evening. A welcome drink which will be served on the Weather Deck from 6pm, with spectacular views over Bristol harbour. If the weather is less kind, we will use the Promenade Deck, where the first-class passengers would take their afternoon stroll on rainy days. This is flooded with natural light and has a number of exhibits that we can explore. At 7:30pm we will assemble for Dinner in the First Class Dining Saloon, which has been completely refurbished in the original style. With marbled pillars and rococo mirrors it makes a grand setting. A three-course meal will be served, with wine. There will be entertainment after the meal and further drinks will be available to purchase. We have exclusive use of the Great Britain from 6pm to midnight and are invited to explore it, making the most of this unique venue. The ship is easy to reach by car, public transport or...

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£142.00

Pride and Prejudice (Sort of!)

Watford Palace Theatre 20 Clarendon Road, Watford

Our Livery has a history of organising visits to leading theatrical events, many of which have won national awards. This show is one of those. Direct from its triumph in the West End where it won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Comedy, and the similar Evening Standard Award, amongst other prizes, Pride and Prejudice* (*sort of), is a unique and audacious retelling of Jane Austen’s most iconic love story. Men, money and microphones are fought over in this irreverent but affectionate adaptation, where the stakes couldn’t be higher when it comes to romance. The critics universally hailed it and typical reviews included:: "This smart, laugh out loud funny show” (Daily Telegraph), "Riotously funny ... gloriously entertaining ... frankly sensational" (Variety), "Faithful to the book, it's also a raucously irreverent romp" (Daily Mail), "It's a blast: Austen turbocharged with utter theatrical audacity" (The i), "Profoundly joyous" (Glasgow Herald) and "Layer upon layer of brilliance" (The Scotsman). The show  also features a string of classic songs, suitably woven into the storyline, and what is amazing is that the entire tale is told by five energetic young women, supported by an very suitable set and an array of props, including a pantomime horse, a floor mop and some marigold rubber gloves! We have booked some of the best seats in the house for the Saturday matinee performance on 24th May at 2.30pm, and will gather beforehand at 12.30pm at the highly-regarded Il Pelligrino restaurant, which is about 100 yards from the theatre, for a nice lunch. There are only eight tickets available, and guests are welcome, so early booking is advisable.

Get Tickets £90.00 2 tickets left

Visit to The Monument and The City’s Oldest Church, plus Lunch

The Monument Fish Street Hill, London

A permanent reminder of the Great Fire of 1666, The Monument commemorates one of the most significant events in London’s history. Standing on the piazza between Fish Street Hill and Monument Street, the 202ft column, designed by Robert Hooke in consultation with Sir Christopher Wren, celebrates the City which rose from the ashes. The Monument was built with a second purpose: also to be a site for scientific experiments. Hidden beneath The Monument is a tiny laboratory from where the column was once used as a giant zenith telescope. This plan was soon abandoned, as the surrounding area was too busy. Tens of thousands of visitors climb The Monument's 311 spiral steps each year, and are rewarded with one of the best vistas of London from the public viewing platform. We are going to join their number, with our own a private tour. After all those steps, our party will walk (slowly!) to the Tower Bridge area, for a relaxing lunch at a Pizza Express, before moving on to All Hallows By the Tower. AHBT, as it's widely known, is not only the City's oldest church, but also a site of great historic significance. The launch site of the world-famous "TOC H" and also home to the world's only trans-global, centrally heated barrel, we will be shown all over the church, including the crypt, by a private guide. Numbers are limited to just 15, and dress is casual, with comfy shoes - remember those 311 steps! Tickets cost £39. (We'll cover our own lunches at the restaurant.)

Get Tickets £39.00 13 tickets left

Tour of the Triforium of St Paul’s

St Paul's Cathedral St Paul's Churchyard, London, United Kingdom

Most Livery Members, after a while, would describe themselves as fairly familiar with our great Cathedral. After all, it is effectively the City Civic's "parish church" (For a start, there is nothing else locally, which is big enough to fit us all in!) and there are services and concerts there, throughout the year. However, what we routinely see, down at floor level, is by no means all that Wren's architectural triumph has to offer, and so this June a party of up to 20 of us will be taken on a private tour of those parts of the Cathedral which the public seldom sees. Our guide will take us up to the Triforium and into the Library and the Trophy Room. We will also see the Great Model, which played such a crucial role in the development of the building's design and engineering during its construction. Then as a finale, we will enjoy the spectacular view down from the top of the iconic Geometric Staircase and another down the nave, from above the Great West Doors. The tour will start at 2.30pm and last about an hour, and for those feeling peckish, the Master will lead a party to a nearby restaurant for a spot of lunch beforehand. Tickets for the tour cost £39 each. Dress will be "smart casual", and the lunch will be publicised and billed separately, for those who wish to attend.

Get Tickets £39.00 16 tickets left

Shrieval Election and Lunch 2025, with former Sheriff Andrew Marsden

Guildhall Club Guildhall Club, Guildhall West Wing, Gresham St, London, London, United Kingdom

Twice a year, the City of London Corporation’s Common Hall is transformed from a standard local authority meeting on civic issues, into a day of great ceremony. Click here for more history and information. Each autumn, Liverymen elect the next year’s Lord Mayor and every summer, it’s the turn of the two Sheriffs. After Common Hall, many Liveries go home, but the Master Chartered Accountant hosts a private Reception and Lunch in the Aldermen's Dining Room. We go up to Guildhall’s roof terrace on the fourth floor for the Reception and then into the Dining Room for lunch. This summer, we will all be delighted to welcome former Sheriff, Past Master Marketor and former FSG Chairman, Andrew Marsden, as our Principal Guest. Andrew will talk to us after the meal about what happens to you, if lucky enough to be elected Sheriff, between that election and when you actually emerge, blinking into the light, as a shiny new Sheriff in September. Happily, Andrew has promised to be highly indiscrete! Partners and guests are very welcome and will be able to have coffee and explore the Guildhall Gallery, while Liverymen are attending the Election Ceremony.   11.30am - Coffee 11.45am - All attending the Election Ceremony must be seated 12noon - Shrieval Election Ceremony 12.45pm - Drinks in the Aldermen's Dining Room 1.15pm - Lunch in the Aldermen's Dining Room Dress: lounge suit or smart day wear Tickets: £98, for Drinks Reception and Lunch

Get Tickets £98.00 24 tickets left

Master’s Weekend in Poole, visiting the RNLI and the Royal Marines

RNLI HQ Poole

The Royal National Lifeboat Institution is one of those great Victorian foundations, the merits of which are as starkly obvious today as they when it was founded. Now a massive national charity, the RNLI today protects seafarers and beach users of all the beaches and waters around the UK, and also those of the Republic of Ireland. It does this through 238 lifeboat stations and 242 lifeguard units. The former deploy a fleet of 432 rescue craft, which they launch about 10,000 times each year, while the latter goes to the aid of some 20,000 people on and around the beaches annually. These services are provided by nearly 10,000 lifeboat volunteers and about 2,500 paid staff, including lifeguards. The RNLI HQ is down in Poole Harbour, where it also recently built a unique and rather smart training college (with extremely comfortable, boat-themed, ensuite bedrooms), which has some rather unusual training facilities. Next door it has constructed an equally specialist factory, in which it builds its iconic and extremely capable lifeboats. For obvious reasons, the public have access to scarcely any of the site, which is entirely focussed on the RNLI volunteers and employees, who go there for its myriad of specialist training courses. However, the Master has persuaded the Principal to allow a party from our Company to stay at the College during the last weekend in June, to see what they do there, how a busy lifeboat station operates, and how the lifeboats are built and maintained. The Royal Marines are one of our nation's two premier light infantry units, and with their amphibious focus, they have bases in various coastal locations around the UK. By chance, one such base is in Poole, located just across the harbour from the RNLI College. We have long affiliated to the key...

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Get Tickets £440.00 – £560.00 20 tickets left

Gilbert and Sullivan’s “Iolanthe”

Buckingham Parish Church Castle Street, Buckingham, United Kingdom

Iolanthe is very much one of "The Big Four", as regards Gilbert and Sullivan's famous light operettas. It combines great tunes with an intricate storyline, half a fairy, lots of full fairies, a blushing Ward of Court, a susceptible Lord Chancellor and seemingly most of the House of Lords - plus a rather chivalrous guardsman. Inevitably, they all get their respective lives into a frightful tangle! Iolanthe's words and music are so strong that they are often performed "in concert" and that is what a party of us is going to see this July, performed by the highly-regarded Buckingham Choral Society, in Buckingham Parish Church. A leading light of the Society is our own Court Assistant Miles Hedges, who a number of us saw in an outstanding performance of The Mikado in the same location, a few years ago. The concert starts at 7.30pm, so we are going to meet for a "theatre supper" beforehand at 5.45pm, at the well-regarded Prego (a good, family-run Italian restaurant), which is just a short walk from the church. Tickets cost £70, to include the meal, (reasonable!) drinks, and tickets to the concert. There are only ten places, so early booking is advisable.

Get Tickets £70.00 4 tickets left

Summer Lunch at Lord’s Cricket Ground

Lord's Cricket Ground St John's Wood Road, London

(We are just awaiting final sign off for the precise date of this event from the England Cricket Board - don't ask, it's way too complicated to explain, even if we understood the reasons! - which should be received in the next week or so. That said, the 27th is looking much the most likely day.) Lord's, in leafy St John's Wood, is the spiritual home of the cricketing world. Owned and managed by the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), the iconic ground boasts some pretty amazing architecture, including the ornate Victorian-era Pavilion, which dominates one end of the field. Many Members are avid cricket followers and regular visitors there, but even for those who are not, a trip to Lord's is to enter a different and extremely interesting world. We are going as guests of the MCC on a day when no matches are being played,  so we should have the place largely to ourselves. We will start with a tour of the ground and then of the Lord's Museum, which houses the original Ashes Urn, amongst many other treasures, before repairing to the Writing Room, overlooking the main cricket square, for lunch. The meal will be the usual three courses, with all the trimmings, and our guest speaker will be the famous England international bowler and latterly, England selector, Angus Fraser. Gus played 87 times for England, and remains the all-time most successful bowler in the West Indies, which was quite a feat when one recalls that in his era it was home to the most fearsome team on the international circuit. Gus was also a long-time giant of the Middlesex County team which included such other greats as Mike Brearley, Andrew Strauss, Mike Gatting, and Phil Edmonds. He followed up his stellar England career by first Captaining the...

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Central London Tour on a Cream Tea Bus

Golden Tours Stop 1 Bulleid Way, London

As the old Routemaster double-decker buses began to approach their retirement from London Transport, intelligent minds turned to the issue of what to do with all these still-working-and-well-maintained icons of our capital's street scene. One wheeze, which was widely scorned when first floated, was to convert a few of them into mobile cream tea restaurants and drive diners around some of London's most famous tourist sites. Roll forward 15 years and the cream tea buses are now a firm fixture on the London scene and it seems only right that our Company should investigate them and see what all the fuss is about! A Livery party is therefore meeting at 3.30pm (so as to avoid there rush hour) near to Victoria Bus Station and from there will be whisked away on a 90-minute tour, whilst sampling an array of scones, sandwiches, cakes and other health foods, plus of course, the obligatory teas and coffees. Tickets cost £45, dress is casual, and Members are very welcome to bring friends and family.

Get Tickets £45.00 36 tickets left

Book of Mormon Theatre Trip and Supper

Prince of Wales Theatre Coventry Street, London

Every so often a show arrives on Broadway or in the West End, which sweeps up all the awards and electrifies the theatre-going public. Obvious examples include, Les Miserables, Phantom, and Hamilton. Recently, it was the outrageous and outstanding (in equal measure) Book of Mormon. This blockbuster musical follows two mis-matched young Mormons, when they are sent to Africa to embark on their missionary work, and the chaos that follows in their wake. When it first appeared on Broadway, Mormon won all the Tony Awards, and tickets changed hands for up to three times their face value! Inevitably the show came to London soon after and here too it swept the boards, winning all the Oliviers, plus numerous other prizes. At one point, the waiting list for tickets was nearly eight months - and that was with two matinees a week! Roll forward to today, three years later, and Mormon is still "packing them in", so we are going to go along and see what all the fuss is about. Because of demand, the theatre has limited our party to just 12 tickets, but they have been kind to us over the price (The Master has friends in low places!) and once the party is booked up, those attending will be circulated about an optional, pre-theatre supper. So come along and enjoy an amazing piece of musical theatre with your livery friends and guests. Tickets cost £49, the show starts at 7.30pm and dress is smart casual.

Get Tickets £40.83 11 tickets left