… to want a London pub wedding for less than £10 grand that ticks all the boxes?

[Worried1305]

We’re looking to get married next summer, and really wanted something quite informal for the reception that doesn’t cost the earth! The ceremony is already booked, for somewhere quite central, but it seems like all the venues we are looking at are £12,000 plus. Is this just what a London wedding costs nowadays and I’m hopelessly out of touch? Alternatively, can anyone suggest somewhere nice, north-ish or central?

What we would like:
*Pub grub
*Able to have a band or a DJ, with space for people to dance but also somewhere people can chat and chill when the music is going on
*Plenty of seating - but not reliant on outside space, because we all know you can’t do that in London, even if it is the summer!
*Ideally exclusive use of the venue (but willing to compromise on this if we have to).

All suggestions welcome, as well as a reality check if our budget (ie under £10 grand) is simply unrealistic! Thanks.

Your first port of call is to Google London pubs with what you want.
Have to say that it is a little bit "entitled" to demand exclusive use.
FWIW we held our wedding reception at a Scottish hotel currently being featured in a series on Chanel 5. It was a lot less than 5k.

There are upstairs rooms in a lot of London pubs
The Roebuck, Borough does goor grub

Old Bank of England Pub, Fleet Street (went to a wedding there last year - amazing interior)

I really don't think you'll get exclusive use of the venue for less than £10k

Dickens Inn, St Katharine’s Dock?

What area of London?

We went to an excellent wedding in this pub with exclusive use but as were guests I have no idea how much it was although I probably drank about a grand's worth of champagne single handed

www.thelondesborough.com/

Yes, look at the City for pubs around Liverpool st, St Paul’s. That area is dead on the weekend so they look to supplement with weddings etc and you should be able to get want you want for that price.

DH and I had our wedding reception at The Fable by Holborn Viaduct- it meets all your criteria. Really nice venue, 3 different floors so separate space to eat, dance and chat. They do have a £10k minimum spend but if you’re having a cash bar that goes towards it so we didn’t actually have to spend that much. Our meal was fish and chips

The Knights Templar, Chancery Lane. It's a wetherspoons (I was looking at getting married there before covid)

What about hiring a boat with a DJ and bar

I was also going to suggest City of London pubs as they don't really get any weekend trade. There are some really historic ones there.

For how many guests? This is a key detail!

If on a budget you may find it best to hire a hall and get a caterer of your choice in.

If you want the place to close to all trade for the night then you basically have to recoup their losses, in addition to the cost of providing the event to you

We hired the Turks Head in Wapping a couple of years ago, for much less than £10k. It wasn’t a wedding, though - I suspect as soon as you say “wedding” rather than “party”, the prices go up.

Look in the city (bank, Liverpool Street etc). There are some nice places around there that are dead at the weekend, so they will often give you exclusive use of the venue for free, but require a minimum spend on food and booze - Less than 10k.

We went to a wedding at the drift bar in the heron tower on that basis. The same company has several other places.

www.drakeandmorgan.co.uk/the-drift/

I had my wedding at the Salisbury on Green Lanes.
It's a nicely restored victorian pub with a good sized back room.
We got use of the back room for free and paid £200 for use of the adjoining bar (there was a sperate bar space open for normal customers)
There was enough space for 150 guests, band and DJ and they did us a good buffet.
This was 10 years ago but might be worth asking....
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Salisbury

Do you want somewhere walkable from the Ceremony, where is the wedding taking place. Congrats btw.

@Scrambledbeans

Yes, look at the City for pubs around Liverpool st, St Paul’s. That area is dead on the weekend so they look to supplement with weddings etc and you should be able to get want you want for that price.

Good point. I went to a brilliant wedding in a pub on the river before Covid. Bride said it was very cheap (or free?) as it's dead at the weekend.

A friend got much cheaper quotes by asking for a party not a wedding!!

As everybody has already said, you need to look at the City area. I've had two birthday parties in pubs near St Paul's that wouldn't usually open on the weekend, so the minimum spend was completely manageable.

Vauxhall tea rooms is lovely and can be exclusively hired. Not sure on price though www.teahousetheatre.co.uk/

it's not 'entitled' to expect exclusive use at all. It's completely normal to have exclusive use at weekends in plenty of City pubs. They're usually shut on Saturday and Sunday so they're all yours by default. You'll be paying for them pulling in staff rather than lost trade.

Second the Londesborough. Depending on how many guests you have they will do it for less than this for the venue, food and drink within reason (although band etc will all be extra).

The food is absolutely brilliant. Loads of people use it for weddings if they get married at Stoke Newington town hall as it's just round the corner.

I can't remember exactly what the maximum capacity was for sit down meal but from memory about 85.

From your list, the only thing if doesn't have is plenty of inside seating once the dance floor is set up. There are acouole of tables to sit at in the bar but it's more mooching and propping up the bar once the party gets going. I actually like this because I hate weddings with massive rooms where even if you have quite a few dancers it looks empty, or which encourages people to sit down. In my opinion you always want a wedding venue to be slightly too small and not the other way round - however that presupposes it's a party and you don't have loads and loads of kids or old people for the evening.

Can't make any suggestions about pubs I'm afraid, but if you're willing to source your own food and drinks, I'd recommend St Stephens in Hampstead - ststephenstrust.co.uk/hire. It's a deconsecrated church and a really stunning space that is reasonably central/easy to get to. Things might have changed now, but at the time I had an event there, it was really cheap, but the hirer had to be prepared to do everything themselves (i.e. source tables and chairs, food, drinks, entertainment etc). There was no corkage charge and bulk buying booze saved us a lot, as well as ordering catering from our favourite cafe. There's an onsite kitchen, so things can be stored in a fridge, plated up out of sight of guests.

I used the Samuel Pepys (on the river near Cannon Street station) for a birthday party once, it was brilliant and a fantastic space with a bar and separate room round the corner.

A friend had a wedding do at Clarette recently too, which was excellent.