Kettering hosts first ever Northants Board Game Convention and not a bored gamer in sight

Over 350 people came to enjoy board games, tournaments and social gaming at Kettering Arts Centre at the event organised by Gavin Price and Dez Dell (of Boards of Kettering) and Kettering Arts Centre manager Rev Tom Houston.

Dez said “Myself and Gav run Boards of Kettering to share our love of board games with the community. We certainly managed that with this convention. Organising it has been a labour of love for us, so we were blown away by how many people came along, especially as everyone we spoke to said they had a brilliant time. Gav is amazing and I couldn’t have done it without him.”

Tom Houston added “We were over the moon with how it went and we're so pleased to see the runaway success. We can't wait for the next one!”

Such was the popularity, people who hadn’t pre-booked tickets had to be turned away at the door.

Dez said: “It was a real shame that we had to turn people away, but at certain points the venue was at capacity. We’ll be looking at how to manage this for any future events. As this was the first board game convention in Northamptonshire, we didn’t know how popular it would be.”

Competitions and tournaments were held on the stage throughout the day and Matt Williams was crowned the Connect Four champion after winning a tense final.

Murder mystery group Invitation 2 Murder ran an interactive crime solving competition throughout the day.

A raffle raised £300 for charity which was split between Kettering MIND and Kettering Arts Centre.

Gavin said “We want to say a huge thank you to all the volunteers who made this such a special and successful event - we appreciate them so much and couldn't have done it with them."

Just over 430 games were available to play on the day from the Boards of Kettering game library. Boards of Kettering are a trader in The Bean Hive (soon to be renamed That Pink Shop) where a wide selection of board games can be purchased.