It was certainly a memorable Henries greeting card awards event last Thursday (October 3), not just for the worthy award winners (see separate story), but for all the 700 attendees, who surrendered to the uplifting vibe of the gathering.
Getting their arms round the ‘100 years of greeting cards’ theme, which tied in with the GCA’s centenary celebration (headline sponsor of The Henries), many guests elected to come attired in keeping with any of the ten decades of the GCA’s heritage.
As Warren Lomax and Jakki Brown, joint managing directors of Max Publishing (which owns and organises The Henries) acknowledged in their welcome speech, that one hundred years ago Britain and indeed the world, had only just emerged from the most horrendous unnecessary loss of human life in history with the four year long, so-called Great War. And then as if to add to the misery in that year, a deadly flu epidemic killed more people globally than even the First World War itself, several good things did come out of that tragic year. Women gained the vote for the first time, for starters – and it also marked the formation of the UK Greeting Card Association, an organisation formed to promote the sending and giving of greeting cards.
“Greeting cards may not be able to cure all the ills of society, but conversely no one would dispute the positive role that the greeting card sending habit, perpetuated by the GCA, has played on increasing human happiness through this special form of social communication… It is certainly a centenary worth celebrating,” said Jakki.
And celebrate they all did. Here’s just a flavour of the historic Henries…
You can see all The Henries 2019 photos (and download any that take your fancy) on: https://maxpublishing.shootproof.com/TheHenries2019
Top: Tom Allen went down fantastically well as host for The Henries 2019.
