Lubbock
In Lubbock, in northwestern Texas, state-of-the-art venues offer a combination of unusual meeting rooms and educational experiences about the early American technology that made it possible for settlers to forge a life in the unforgiving Texan territories.
The National Ranching Heritage Center integrates 16 acres of original ranch with more than 20 ranch buildings from the 1700s up to the 1950s that were collected and transported to the chronological open-air exhibit space. Groups can explore such exhibits as a pioneer cabin and a sheep hospital outside, and a vast collection of rifles and rare saddles inside.
From the outside, the Bayer Museum of Agriculture looks like your average red barn, but the eco-friendly structure is full of high-tech exhibits, such as cotton-stripping. tractor-driving digital simulations and on-demand holographic presentations that re-enact traditional jobs like blacksmithing.
Across the highway, the American Wind Power Center and Museum traces the history of the machine that powered the growth of the West from 1854 to 1920, following the history of American wind power from the first hand-hewn models to the game-changing Aeromotor to modern turbines. Lisa Grinstead, Visit Lubbock sales manager, said that it is a favorite meeting rental facility for lunches, day meetings, receptions and more.
As Lubbock is home to Texas Tech University, a Big 12 school, Grinstead advised that groups avoid graduation week in May, when all available rooms fill up with visiting families.
Amarillo
Though Amarillo has meeting space at its downtown Civic Center and Wyndham Garden, its real draw lies outside the city, where meeting spaces bridge both the great outdoors and modern technology, as well as the history of the Old West and the needs of today’s visitors.
Known as the Grand Canyon of Texas, Palo Duro Canyon is the second-largest canyon in the United States and features remains of Western history from Native American settlement 1,500 years ago through the Spanish and Anglo immigrations. Its recently constructed Mack Dick Group pavilion that offers Wi-Fi and complete audiovisual capability in the middle of the park is one of the most sophisticated venues in the area, according to Eric Miller, director of communications for the Amarillo Convention and Visitors Council. Closer to town, the American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame tells the story of the horse that settled the West.
Though Amarillo is outside the range of many of Texas’ major airports and cities, it’s more convenient to more departure points outside the state than most Lone Star State destinations.
“Amarillo really is in the middle of the country,” said Miller. “If you look at the map, we’re actually a lot farther north than people realize. We’re right on I-40 and Route 66, so it’s a major driving artery, and we have a great airport served by three major airlines that was updated in the last five years.”
Austin
When it comes to Texas meeting destinations, Austin is a distinct outlier. Its culture is so different than that of the rest of the state that many joke it’s not part of Texas.
On the meeting and events side, Austin is best known for the high-tech “nerdfest” that has put it on the country’s cultural map: South by Southwest (SXSW). This whirlwind weeklong festival, which brings together the biggest companies and personalities in the world and takes over every room for miles around each March, personifies the trendy, techy culture that has made Austin a hub for startups.
But while so many things about Austin — the fashion, the food and, of course, the Wi-Fi — tend to the hypermodern, the city still knows how to get down to its Wild West roots. Austin is home to one of the state’s most iconic honky-tonk music halls, The Broken Spoke, which is available for private events.
Rattle Inn, co-owned by Ray Benson from the Grammy Award-winning music group Asleep at the Wheel, is a Western-themed bar with a private event space downstairs that puts a slightly ironic slant on the theme with ubiquitous snakeskin accouterments and taxidermy decor.
Outside town, two main venues offer a chance to dive headfirst into ranch life: the Texas Old Town working ranch — complete with longhorns in the fields — and the Star Hill Ranch, which has served as a Western backdrop for films like “The Alamo.”
In addition to SXSW, citywide conventions take over the hotels in the convention center area throughout much of September and October, so Janice Foster, assistant director of convention services at the Austin Convention and Visitors Bureau, advised it can be hard to find hotels downtown during that period. “Try March and April, when the wildflowers are in bloom, the temperature is nice, and the waterfront is gorgeous,” she said.
