The National Exhibition Centre (NEC) is an exhibition centre in Birmingham, England. It is near junction 6 of the M42 motorway, and is adjacent to Birmingham International Airport and Birmingham International railway station. It has 20 interconnected halls, set in grounds of 628 acres (2.54 km2) making it the largest exhibition centre in the UK. It is the busiest and seventh-largest exhibition centre in Europe.
Opened by Elizabeth II in February 1976, the first event to be staged at the venue was International Spring Fair, which has returned every year since. Growing annually, the event now occupies all of the NEC's 20 halls and the LG Arena.
Read more about National Exhibition Centre: History, Shows, LG Arena, Car Parks, NEC Group, Gallery
Famous quotes containing the words national, exhibition and/or centre:
“[D]rilling and arming, when carried on on a national scale, excite whole populations to frenzies which end in war.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
“Work, as we usually think of it, is energy expended for a further end in view; play is energy expended for its own sake, as with children’s play, or as manifestation of the end or goal of work, as in “playing” chess or the piano. Play in this sense, then, is the fulfillment of work, the exhibition of what the work has been done for.”
—Northrop Frye (1912–1991)
“The bogholes might be Atlantic seepage.
The wet centre is bottomless.”
—Seamus Heaney (b. 1939)