Building up a reputation

Date: 18/06/1998

The names of the buildings where the summit took place resonated with historical meaning. The French and Dutch delegations - not the best of friends after recent squabbles over drugs policy and the presidency of the European Central Bank - were thrown together in the Redwood Building.

Fortunately, this particular edifice was named after 19th-century pharmacist Theopholus Redwood and not John Redwood, one of former UK Prime Minister John Major's most Eurosceptic ministers. When asked whether their place of work was named after the latter Redwood, who also served for a time as a less-than-popular minister for Wales, the staff on the door replied, “God, no!”