Anne and Ian were delighted to be able to attend last nights special event to celebrate the re-building of the RAD Sydney Headquarters. The building was officially opened by Darcey Bussell CBE and David McAllister AM and the whole event was sponsored by IDS so all those attending had a special IDS “goody bag”!

The fabulous new offices have transformed the Sydney HQ into a modern space which is so much more suitable for such an influential organisation as the RAD.

Here is a picture of Darcey and David with Bronwen who is the Australian regional administrator for the RAD as well as a photo of Ian with Luke Rittner (RAD CEO) and some of the RAD Sydney staff who helped to distribute our goody bags.

The Dance Teachers Club of Boston were honoured last night at the Teacher Appreciation Party. Here they are receiving their award from UDMA Board member Dan from Dancers Inc. Congratulations DTCB!

What a wonderful time we have had at the fabulous Red Rock Resort for the Dance Teacher Web Expo and conference. It is such a friendly conference and gives plenty of opportunity for delegates and vendors to really get to know each other. We have made many new friends and look forward to seeing them again next year!

I know we will be back. However we are about to leave for the airport and our 10 hour flight back home!
Here we are saying goodbye to Steve and Angela.

Wow! The Red Rock hotel is an amazing venue for a Conference and we are lucky enough to be here as part of the Dance Teacher Conference and Expo.

Although we are situated in the middle of the desert on the outskirts of Las Vegas the hotel is about to be turned into an oasis of dance for the next few days. Ian, Allison and I are just about to set up our booth before the conference launch party this evening.

We look forward to seeing lots of familiar faces as well as making new friends. Amazingly, the first dance teacher I spoke to this morning was from my home town of Liverpool!

Here’s a little bit of sunshine from the hotel for you!

One of our very good customers recently staged their show in a theatre in Devon. It runs for almost two weeks and they buy all their costumes from us so we always try and go and see it. Eight of us went last Friday and it really was excellent.

Here are Andrew and I with Lucie Grace who is one of the principals of Sidmouth Ballet School. Well done to all those who were part of it!

On Friday 4th March 2011 Andrew Ward and Jan Chope flew to Porto in Portugal to attend the Semana Internacional de Bailado do Porto. This was the first International Dance competition to be held in Porto and was organised by one of our customers, Sofia Marques Da Silva. Dancers from Spain and Portugal entered and there were competitions for soloists and groups. The Soloists competition was Ballet and the group competition was a mix of Classical and Contemporary/Jazz.

The Semi finals for the Solo Benjamins (Toddlers) and the group dances were held on Saturday when Andrew and Jan were joined by Philippa, a professional dancer, to judge who was to go through to the finals on Sunday.

On Sunday the semi finals for the Junior and Senior soloists took place in the afternoon, judged by Andrew Ward a guest teacher at English National Ballet, Pedro Carneiro and Constanca Couto from the Escola de Danca do Conservato and Alicia Montero from Conservatorio Carmen Amaya. They then judged the Finals in the evening.

While they were there Andrew and Jan talked to the dance teachers and gave them a catalogue and goody bag. These teachers will be contacted by Jan in the coming weeks to answer any questions they might still have.

This is a photo of Andrew with Sofia Marques Da Silva on his right, who organised the Semana Internacional de Bailado do Porto, and her assistant Jacinta on his left. The children in our costumes are from her school, Escola de Bailado Espaco Danca in Porto.

We have had a wonderful day today at 890 Broadway which is the home of American Ballet Theatre and their school. 15 delightful young students modelled the new range of girls and boys outfits in 13 new and vibrant colours.

The 75 teachers who were at ABT for a week of intensive training were thrilled to see the unveiling of this fabulous new range which is available to pre order now and will be in stock from April. They loved the new colours, new fabric and new styles and were all talking excitedly about how they could also use the garments for recitals.

Rachel Moore, CEO of ABT introduced Andrew and I and then the delightful models joined us to show off all the colours and styles.

Here Ian, Andrew and I are joined by Rachel Moore and Franco De Vita and all our models.

Sunday saw me in Wigan for the official relaunch of Freestyle Dancewear which has been transformed into Pointes Dancewear. An amazing transformation has taken place resulting in a fabulously enticing pink heaven of a shop! Owners Laura and Chris Blackburn are specialising in the fitting of pointe shoes and are aiming to attract customers from around the north west.

The Grand Opening was performed by Francesca Filpi of The Royal Ballet Company who had spent the day teaching locally for CLB Productions also run by Laura and Chris.

1st Position takes centre stage at Covent Garden with each and everyone of the 225 Royal Ballet School students performing at their annual school performance receiving a well done and thank you goodie bag.   

IDS pictured the two lead dancers in The Lilac Garden, Angela Wood and William Bracewell who will join ENB and BRB respectively.  Wayne Sleep who was IDS’s guest at the performance was thrilled with the show spotting his favourites to look out for in next year’s performance.