10 unusual Christmas party venues

Those working in PR and comms will know all too well about planning for Christmas at a time of year when everybody is wearing beachwear and cranking up the office aircon. For those working in the industry, the average summer could see them tucking into turkey sandwiches at a festive food launch, planning a seasonal campaign or… plotting the annual work do.

All PRs love a good Christmas soiree, and the more unusual the better. Here are some of the more unique venues available to hire across the UK, from racecourses to indoor ski slopes… 

 1. Chester Zoo

Think your team are real party animals? Office merrymakers can put their celebration-loving ways to the test by carousing alongside penguins, rhinos and orangutans at Chester Zoo’s Christmas ‘Company Zoo Days’. When not chowing down on the festive buffet inside the zoo’s atrium, they can meet 37,000 animals and mosey through its Christmassy Lanterns and Light illuminated trail (last year’s route featured LED-lit elephants and a life-size woolly mammoth hologram). From £65 per person.

2. Natural History Museum

One of London’s best-loved museums has a staggering eight venues to hire for Xmas-related fun meaning businesses can host their yearly bash underneath its famous 4.5-tonned blue whale skeleton, dine alongside a giant stegosaurus, and gape at the museum’s show-stealing animatronic T-rex, who dons a festive jumper every Christmas. From £175 per person. 

• How to book the Natural History Museum for your event.

3. Alcotraz

If you haven’t encountered Alcotraz before, it’s a prison-themed cocktail bar inspired by the forbidding San Francisco island penitentiary which housed Al Capone and ‘Birdman’ Robert Franklin Stroud. Alcotraz has six bars across the UK (Bristol; Cardiff; London; Brighton; Manchester; Liverpool) offering immersive Christmas-in-the-clink experiences, where guests can wear orange jumpsuits and smuggle in their own contraband cocktails past the guards. 

4. Steam Dreams

All aboard the polar express (kind of). Rail company Steam Dreams are offering festive days out aboard their vintage diesels which visit the Christmas markets in Bath, York and Chester (trains depart from London, Colchester and Southend). Champagne-fuelled Pullman dining available; companies can hire entire carriages or tables. From £165 per person. 

5. The Cutty Sark

Back when the tea-clipper was in its 19th-century prime, Christmas parties probably involved a few scraps of mouldy bread and a dose of scurvy. Today it’s a different affair. Hiding underneath the hull of the venerable vessel is its Dry Berth venue, where guests can gorge on turkey dinners while gazing up at the 963-ton ship above or across to glimmering views of the Thames. The Cutty Sark’s Dry Berth area is available to hire from £10,500.

6. The Jockey Club 

The Jockey Club owns some of the UK’s most famous racecourses, including Aintree, Cheltenham, Newmarket, Carlisle, Exeter and more. This Yuletide they’re offering an ‘Apres Ski’ winter wonderland theme which promises “alpine elegance and frosty festivities” inside its wintry lodge, alongside lots of equine-related merrymaking. Find out more about the Jockey Club's locations to hire.

7. Alea Casinos

Having your staff fritter away their Christmas bonuses at a roulette or blackjack table might not be what most PR firms have in mind for their Noel get-together, but the corporate parties at Alea Casinos also offer seasonal fare and drinks aplenty (they’re committed to safe gambling too). Check it out at their Glasgow or Nottingham venues.

8. Snozone

The chances of a white Christmas are perennially remote (the last widespread Xmas flurry in the UK was in 2010). The next best thing for a frosty yuletide is Snozone, which offers an indoor ski slope with real snow and sledging, plus parties for up to 400 guests including a buffet cooked by their Alpine Kitchen chefs. Available at the Snozones in Milton Keynes and Yorkshire.

9. Hever Castle & Gardens

Hever Castle in Kent dates to the 13th century. The childhood home of Anne Boleyn (one of the beheaded ones) it’s also available for corporate Christmas events too. The Traitors-like stronghold offers a Tudor minstrel, log fires, carol singing, banquets to sate Henry VIII and an outdoors winter wonderland in its 125-acres of gardens. Hever Castle has two venues to hire: its Astor Wing/Castle Dining Hall and the Guthrie Pavilion.

10. Aerospace Bristol

Have a truly supersonic seasonal shebang by celebrating with colleagues underneath the wings of Concorde at this Bristol aviation museum. The venue seats up to 500 guests with a three-course dinner and Christmassy cocktail included. There’s also an opportunity at Aeropsace Bristol to step aboard the iconic jet itself for a private viewing. From £71.30 per person.

Christian Koch is an award-winning journalist, editor, content strategist and brand consultant.