At the reception desk facing the elevator, three "judges" scored guests as they arrived.
Photo: Victor Castro
As guests told stories about their favorite "360 moment," graphic recorder Greg Gersch illustrated them on a colorful mural. Guests received a copy of the finished image after the event.
Photo: Ben Droz
Add a bit of Hollywood to a teambuilding event with TeamBonding's Make-A-Movie experience. The company’s facilitators begin the event with a short skit and then challenge each team of employees to make their own movie around a specific theme. TeamBonding provides digital video cameras and all editing services. The groups reconvene to screen each of the movies and vote on categories such as best actor and best director. The organizer also receives a DVD with all of the movies on it.
Photo: Courtesy of TeamBonding
Adventure Associates' “GeoTrek” activity is based on the recreational sport of geocaching—using GPS devices to locate containers, known as “caches.” The company has courses in 75 locations around the country, including one at Walt Disney World that requires participants to use the monorail, boats, and walking between resorts to locate each cache. Organizers provide a brief lesson on how to use GPS, and then teams of about four people each choose which caches they will attempt to locate based on point values, distances, and strategy. When teams reconvene, the company’s facilitators can lead participants in a discussion of what they learned followed by a tallying of each team’s scores.
Photo: Courtesy of Adventure Associates
Smartphone cameras drive the fun in Corporate Games Team Building's Paparazzi game. Organizers divide participants into groups of about eight people each and give them a list of photographs and a bag of costumes and props. Teams then have a set amount of time to travel around a venue or within a designated part of the city, to capture as many of the photos as possible. Examples include a photo of team members posing as celebrities dining alfresco or a photo of team members hosting a cooking show. Organizers score the photos as they come in and put them into a slide show which can be viewed by everyone at the end of the event.
Photo: Courtesy of Corporate Games Team Building
Wizard Studios uses its SuperSonic LED Strobe bracelets to activate team challenges for corporate groups. The wristbands emit bright, colored lights and flashing strobes. Organizers can control the bands remotely to command a team to perform a predetermined activity on cue. The company can work with hosts to develop a program of various challenges and prizes, and after the teambuilding event, the bracelets can also be activated during a party.
Photo: Courtesy of Wizard Studios
Classic game shows get a new twist in Wildly Different's iPlay event. The company provides iPads that teams use to complete challenges modeled after traditional game show activities. In “Survey Says,” participants must rank the answers provided from most popular to least popular in categories such as “top-selling candy bars” and “favorite pastimes.” In “What’s the Tune,” players hear snippets of music and must name the song or artist. The iPads automatically tally each team’s points, and at the end members of the winning team join the M.C. on stage to receive their awards.
Photo: Courtesy of Wildly Different
In Corporate Games Team Building's Amazing Journey activity, teams must decipher clues using their smartphones and complete physical and mental challenges provided by facilitators stationed in various locations. Each completed task helps team members figure out the 10 cities in the world that comprise their “race route,” and the first team to complete the route wins. The event can take place anywhere, inside a hotel or conference center or around a few city blocks, and the clues can be customized to align with an event’s theme or goals.
Photo: Courtesy of Corporate Games Team Building
In the Spy Game, from the Go Game, participants work in teams to complete a series of activities and solve clues provided via smartphone, all based on the premise that someone from their company has been kidnapped and they need to solve the crime. Missions may include having to spell a word without writing, creating videos, and engaging with actors they may encounter throughout the designated course. Each game takes about two hours and combines some high-tech activities with more campy elements such as disguises and cracking codes.
Photo: Courtesy of the Go Game
The Alcoholic Architecture cloud is composed of fine spirits and mixers at a ratio of one to three and made using powerful humidifiers to super-saturate the air. Alcohol enters the bloodstream through the body’s mucus membranes: primarily the lungs but also the eyeballs. By "breathing" the cocktail, alcohol bypasses the liver, allowing guests to consume 40 percent less to feel the same effect, plus the high humidity level enhances the flavor.
Photo: Ann Charlott Ommedal
The event is being held in a custom dome—known as the Sensorium—that's stationed on King Street West. The event was open to the public, and tickets quickly sold out. Each dinner holds 80 guests.
Photo: Stella Artois
360-degree projections change throughout the evening and are designed to enhance certain elements of the courses that are being served.
Photo: Stella Artois
The Stella Artois chalice, which inspired the event, is bathed in cinematic lights during the dinner.
Photo: Stella Artois
The first course of raw petite vegetables is planted in a plot of mushroom soil that runs down the tables. Servers dig out the vegetables with trowels. Chef Richie Farina created the menu.
Photo: Stella Artois
A course called "Sea Flavour" contains seared and dehydrated scallops, poached halibut, and young coconut puree. Dry ice with a briny scent accompanied the dish.
Photo: Stella Artois
The "Hot Sounds" course includes vegetable broth paired with crispy rice noodles. During the course, a live drummer plays; speakers underneath each table cause the dishes to shake to the beat of the drums.
Photo: Stella Artois
The course called "Nature's Textures" has a "bird's nest" made out of braised beef and served with caramelized cauliflower puree, mushroom leaves, salsify branches, succulent greens, and cauliflower soil. The dish was served under a glass dome that held the aroma of a campfire.
Photo: Stella Artois
The final course, called "Touch Light," offered a modern take on s'mores. The dish put chocolate ganache and graham cracker bits inside of a marshmallow, and guests roasted their own desserts over open flames.
Photo: Stella Artois
'Playboy Party
Playboy's March issue will be the first to feature the brand's highly publicized redesign. To get a sneak peek at the issue, guests could post to Instagram to receive a copy from a social-media-activated vending machine.
Photo:Â Kevin Mazur
4. Turn Them Into Custom Takeaways
At South by Southwest in Austin, Texas, last year, BuzzFeed's BFF Clubhouse offered an emoji fortune-teller. By looking at the most recently selected emoji on guests’ own smartphones, the fortune-teller picked the person’s fortune. The slip of paper, similar to one found in a fortune cookie, included an emoji recommended for guests to use more.
Photo:Â Nadia Chaudhury/BizBash
Picnic Lunch
To encourage attendees to mingle, organizers provided blankets and picnic baskets filled with food for six and invited them to find others to share it.
Photo: Ryan Lash/TED
