In this series, features and series developer Heather Nicholls takes you behind the scenes of some of the most compelling brand activations and events.
This week we meet, The Intrepid Collective, the agency behind Baker Street Quarter Partnership’s ‘Summer in the Square’.
The Brief:
For six days each summer, Portman Square is transformed from one of Marylebone’s elegant garden squares into a vibrant destination for thousands of workers, residents and visitors.
At the centre is a giant screen showing Wimbledon. Around it, street food is served, deckchairs fill the lawn, families take part in activities, local businesses host workshops and wellness sessions, and the Square takes on a completely different energy.
But behind those six days is months of planning, coordination and collaboration.
For the fourth consecutive year, The Intrepid Collective worked with Baker Street Quarter Partnership to deliver their flagship event – Summer in the Square – managing everything from local businesses liaison through to programming, production, partnerships and live event delivery.
The Execution:
Summer in the Square may look effortless once visitors arrive, but creating an event in the heart of central London involves a significant operational undertaking.
Planning begins months in advance, building the programme and production plan while considering everything from infrastructure, power and site layouts to licensing, health and safety, accessibility, security, staffing and supplier logistics.
There were also multiple audiences to think about. The event needs to work for local office workers looking for somewhere to spend their lunch break, residents enjoying the Square, families visiting at weekends and Wimbledon fans wanting to settle in for an afternoon of tennis.
The Intrepid Collective’s role is to bring all of those elements together into one cohesive experience, while ensuring the event remains firmly connected to the BID and the neighbourhood around it.
One of the most important elements of Summer in the Square is that it isn’t simply an event that happens in Marylebone. It is an event shaped by Marylebone.
For 2026, The Intrepid Collective worked with 19 local businesses, developing opportunities for them to contribute to the programme, promote their businesses and engage directly with thousands of potential customers.
Behind the scenes, the Intrepid team liaises individually with businesses, understanding what they can offer, exploring how it could work within the event and then coordinating the practicalities required to make it happen.
It means balancing commercial opportunity with audience experience, ensuring partners receive meaningful visibility and engagement while every activation still feels like a natural part of Summer in the Square. The result is a programme that showcases the neighbourhood while giving local businesses a genuine platform within one of the BID’s biggest annual events.
The giant Wimbledon screen provides the natural heartbeat of Summer in the Square, but the wider programme is carefully designed to give people multiple reasons to visit and to stay. Across six days, tennis sits alongside food and drink, family entertainment, interactive games and a curated wellness programme, creating different experiences throughout the day and across the week.
Programming an event like this is a balancing act. There needs to be enough activity to create energy without competing with key Wimbledon matches. That rhythm is an important part of the placemaking. The aim isn’t simply to create footfall, but to encourage people to dwell, socialise and experience Portman Square – and the wider Baker Street and Marylebone area – differently.
Once build begins, months of planning become very real, very quickly. Infrastructure arrives. The screen goes in. Power is connected. Suppliers are coordinated. Food traders load in. Furniture is positioned. Branding appears. Activities are installed. Partners arrive for their sessions.
Intrepid’s onsite team sits at the centre of that moving operation, managing suppliers, traders, performers, partners and event staff while responding to the inevitable live-event variables – from changing Wimbledon schedules to the British summer weather.
For visitors, the ambition is that none of that complexity is visible. They should simply be able to walk into the Square, grab some food, find a deckchair and enjoy the experience.
The Results:
In 2026, more than 17,000 people visited Summer in the Square across six days, creating significant footfall and commercial opportunities for participating traders and businesses.
National media coverage extended that impact beyond the Square itself, helping establish the event as a recognisable summer destination moment within Baker Street Quarter Partnership’s annual programme.
But for the agency, the success of Summer in the Square is about more than visitor numbers and it about what happens when strong event production, local business engagement and thoughtful programming come together: a garden square becomes a shared social space; businesses are given new ways to connect with their audiences; workers have a reason to leave their desks; residents see their neighbourhood animated; and thousands of people spend more time experiencing the area.