LDNGuide
London’s Best Private Dining Rooms
Here’s our complete guide to the best private dining rooms in the city, with capacity from 10 to over 80.
There you are, just living your life, when your mum declares you need to book a private dining room because your aunt’s schnauzer finally bagged a podium place at Crufts. Just us? OK, well, there are many reasons you might need a private dining room. Whether it’s a family celebration, a big birthday, a press launch, or your boss has tasked you with scouting out a location for your work party, here are the best private dining rooms in London.
PRIVATE ROOMS FOR 8-15ish
Capacity: The Garden Room - 8 / The Pasta Room - 10
Minimum Spend: The Garden Room - £1000 / The Pasta Room - £1200
We’ve had dreams about a place called The Pasta Room, but they mostly involved Jeff Goldblum hand feeding us tagliatelle while he told us we were special. Sadly, Jeff isn’t part of the private dining package at upmarket Italian spot Luca, but the Clerkenwell restaurant does have a pasta room nonetheless. It’s where the chefs make fresh pasta daily and is designed to look and feel like a traditional Italian home kitchen. In case that doesn’t take your fancy, there’s also The Garden Room that overlooks the open kitchen, with enough foliage and warm lighting to potentially make it London’s most romantic private dining room.
Capacity: 10
Minimum spend: Lunch - £500 / dinner - £800
Noble Rot does the best bread in London. Technically, they actually do a whole lot more than that—please see, award-winning wine lists, delightful slip soles, deeply sexy leather banquette seating. But it’s important to know about the bread if, like us, your priorities tend to rotate around show-stopping carbohydrates. You’ll find the private dining area on the second floor of the exceptional Soho spot, adjacent to the self-proclaimed ‘wine cellar of dreams’. For smaller groups, you can kick it à la carte or opt for a set menu if you’re rolling with more than seven people.
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Capacity: 10
Minimum Spend: £1000
Your boss keeps calling you the name of someone they fired six months ago. Booking Holborn Dining Room’s private dining space for that project dinner is exactly the kind of power move that might, maybe, get them to call you by your real name. Or at least the name of someone who’s still employed at the company. A kitchen by day, come night The Pie Room is an exclusive private dining space with easy access to the curried mutton pie, as well as other British classics like roast Suffolk pork belly and sticky toffee pudding. Between the simple candelabras, red leather setting, and metal pie moulds on the walls, this place in Holborn is a proper charmer.
Capacity: KTV Room - 14 / Entertainment Room - 15
Hire Fee: Evening £199 / Matinee £99 / Off-peak £69
Bao are great at everything they do. If they were a person we’d find this wildly annoying, but when it comes to needing somewhere that’s exceptional at making bao, serving signature umeshu negronis, and being home to some achingly cool branding, you can’t beat them. The low-key noodle shop is just a short walk away from Shoreditch High Street station, and it has not one, but two downstairs entertainment rooms that you can hire out. Whether you opt for the large private dining table room or the space with the karaoke system is up to you, and how tolerant you are of your mate’s attempt to hit Whitney Housten’s high notes. Either way, we’re sure the ‘Call for Service’ buttons will come in handy.
Capacity: 12
Spend: £100 per person with a minimum of 9 guests
The food at this Shoreditch basement restaurant is best described as tapas, but make it fine dining. There are gooey little croquetas topped with high-end Jabugo jamon ibérico, chorizo brioche buns served with quail eggs, and a lobster paella that’s basically the Met Gala of glam rice dishes. Inside the Mondrian hotel, you’ll find their private dining room hidden on the floor beneath the restaurant. It’s a warm, boujie space complete with a fireplace, and you also have the option to create your own bespoke event menu. Hint: that lobster paella should be on it.
Capacity: 12
Minimum Spend: £400
You’re super hyped to have your friends over for a dinner party. It’s just, you have zero cooking skills, own exactly three spoons, and only one of them is clean. Plus, having people over would mean having to finally invest in a decent hoover. Tricky. Very tricky. Go ahead and book the private dining room at Soho’s 10 Greek Street instead. With a big wooden oval table, wild flowers in old milk bottles, and a vintage rug, it’s pretty much like entertaining at home, but with chefs who can cook much better than you. To feel like the top host you are (kind of), ask for their ‘little black book’, a handwritten list of rare wines to match the seasonal French food.
Capacity: 8-12
Minimum Spend: There’s no hire fee or minimum spend, but the feasting menu is £35 per person. Dinner only.
Spending your night in an old public toilet might sound more like the birthdays of your student years, than the sophisticated private dining experience you’re looking for these days, but that’s exactly what Coal Office has to offer. They’ve converted the old ladies toilets of Peckham station into a moody, candlelit restaurant, with an upstairs private dining area that's perfect for a grown-up birthday or an opportunity to get drunk with some of your crew while working your way through the £35 feasting menu.
Capacity: 14
Minimum Spend: £1400
The private dining options at Mayfair’s Gymkhana aren’t rooms, they're vaults. Which is perfect if you’re James Bond, allergic to sunlight, or just need a truly memorable, intimate space for a private dinner. There’s red leather banquette seating, a range of contemporary Indian set menus, recommended florists, music options, and the bar is open until 1am.
Capacity: 10-12
Minimum Spend: No hire fee or minimum spend. Set menu starts at £55 per person.
The private dining room at handmade pasta spot Bancone in Covent Garden is all about distressed wood, rustic walls, and that rural Italian look. Their three-course feasting menu is £55 per person with everything from beef shin ossobucco ravioli to their must-order silk handkerchiefs. It’s a very decent, affordable option for lunch or dinner, but it’s probably better suited to an engagement party, birthday, or family celebration than an outing with the colleagues.
Capacity: 16
Minimum Spend: Lunch - £1000 / Dinner - £1500
French and British classics meets upscale Russian spot, Bob Bob Ricard has quite the private dining room. Think The Last Meal but inside Elton John’s crib, all designed by an oligarch with a passion for royal blue. The look is basically ‘I breathe wealth, eat money for breakfast, and really bloody love mahogany’. But, what else would you expect from a Soho restaurant with a 'press for champagne' button? This place was built for special occasions. Or just really blowing some serious caviar cash on your corporate card.
Capacity: The Bidi Room - 16 / The Kukri Room - 10 / The Pot Luck Room - 18
Minimum Spend: Dependent on room and date. Ranges from £500-£1800 for dinner.
Grown-up Indian playground Brigadiers has three private dining rooms. All of the rooms have HD TV screens with airplay mode, wifi, and music options, but each has its own thing going on. The Kukri Room has a bespoke table that can transform into a games table. The Bidi Room is more intimate with vintage cigarette card silk wallpaper. And the Pot Luck Room has old-school ceiling fans and a help-yourself drink station. Come to this City restaurant to eat London’s best lamb chops with friends, colleagues, or family.
Capacity: 6-14
Minimum Spend: None, but the set menu starts at £65 per person and goes up to £120 for a game special
The time has finally come. After eight years of hard work, your friend has finally been promoted to Chief Nail Polish Naming Officer. A day this special deserves the private dining room at old-school British spot Quality Chop House. The space in Clerkenwell is sophisticated in a deep grey, brooding way, with candelabras, flowers, and dainty crockery. Don’t miss the confit potatoes.
Capacity: Semi-private vaults - 8 / Full lower ground floor - 55
Minimum Spend: Semi-private vaults - £150-£250 depending on the day Full lower ground floor - £6500-£8500 depending on the day
We don’t like to refer to ourselves as curry experts. We prefer ‘curry aficionados’. And according to us, the bone marrow varuval at Hoppers is among the best in London. This excellent Sri Lankan spot in Soho also has two private dining options—their downstairs semi-private candlelit vaults that almost made us say the word ‘booth-tastic’ out loud, or the option to rent the whole lower ground floor for 55 people. But whether you go for a birthday party involving the 42-hour roast lamb shoulder vault feast, or a cool, original engagement party, their signature hoppers are a must-order.
Capacity: Hide (And Seek) - 12 (or 24 combined). The Reading Room & The Shadow Room - 6. The Broken Room - 4.
Minimum Spend: Hide (And Seek) - £2000 (or £3500 combined). The Reading Room & The Shadow Room - £500. The Broken Room - £300.
Being able to always buy the extra soft toilet paper is one way of knowing you’ve made it. Finding yourself in one of the private dining rooms at Hide is another. They have four private dining rooms, ranging from a bright, sleek space for up to 24 on their mezzanine that you can access via a private lift, to their intimate group booths in their vaulted bar, The Reading Room and The Shadow Room. All the spaces here might sound like they were once home to a government conspiracy meeting, but the food is excellent and you can expect second-to-none service.
PRIVATE ROOMS FOR 15-25ish
Capacity: 25
Minimum Spend: None, but set menus start from £50 per person
Barrafina’s trademark sleek stool seating and counter eating aren’t usually conducive to big groups. But some locations of the Spanish tapas mini-empire have a secret weapon in the form of private dining rooms, for big birthdays, team dinners, or just bringing a crew together to toast over pan con tomate. Our favourite is the basement space at the Drury Lane restaurant. It’s warm, cosy, and classy, with an open kitchen where chefs will prepare your group’s set feasting menu of Barrafina classics.
Capacity: 18
Minimum Spend: £1500
There are few things more sensual than the words ‘salon privé’. However, a close runner-up is ‘comté gougères’. You’ll find both at this warm, stylish restaurant in Mayfair where the private dining room is a glass-fronted wine cellar. Yes, you read that right. From our experience, the service here tends to be exceptional without ever teetering into stuffiness, and your private dining experience comes with complimentary place cards, wifi, and your own sound system.
Capacity: 20
Spend: Lunch - £50 per person / Dinner - £100 per person
Cicchetti is home to a private dining room with a table that is so spectacularly long that it has ‘plonk your annoying brother-in-law down the end’ written all over it. In case the hint hint, nudge nudge location next to Harrods doesn’t give it away, this is an Italian restaurant with a rich plush look and even richer gorgonzola gnocchi. Did we mention the chandeliers? It’s private dining in Knightsbridge baby, of course there are chandeliers.
Capacity: 20
Minimum Spend: entirely dependent on date, time, and group size. Contact info@mangal2.com directly.
Ever since the Dirik brothers revamped their father’s old-school N16 Turkish restaurant in 2020, we’ve watched with interest—usually while simultaneously chewing on some essential handmade mushroom manti. It’s a rebrand that’s most definitely found its groove, and you can hire out the basement for an evening of fun with your own pre-arranged menu of things like mackerel pide and must-order ocakbasi-grilled razor clams.
Capacity: 15-24 seated
Minimum Spend: £900
If you want your private event to be all about mezze, plastic foliage, and people smiling like they just encountered their first ever labradoodle, then look no further than Lemonia. This old-school Greek restaurant in Primrose Hill never fails to make us happy and has one of the more affordable private options in London, with sharing and set menus that are both around the £30 mark. Expect lots of lamb, grilled fish, halloumi, baklava, and plenty of vegetarian options.
Capacity: 25
Spend: £2200
Café Deco is simply a bloody lovely place to be. Yes, we’re allowed to swear because this is a grown-up place for grown-up people who have a deep appreciation for polite portions of grilled meat, borlotti bean stews, and mussels served with hefty chips. If that sounds like something you’d rightfully be very into, then you should book the basement of this excellent British restaurant in Bloomsbury. It’s a sophisticated but low-key space. Think white tablecloths, white walls, lovely little candles, and mood lighting. FYI they have a great wine list too.
Capacity: 20
Spend: £78 lunchtime set menu / £98 dinner set menu
James Bond would love Min Jiang’s dining room. We can’t actually confirm this, seeing as we don’t run in the same circles as 007 and importantly, he’s fictional, but we stand by this statement. For starters, this upmarket Chinese spot’s PDR has mirrored walls that reflect the restaurant’s views across Hyde Park and allow you to simultaneously eat while checking out your own outfit. That’s classy. In case you’re not already sold, know that the ‘legendary wood-fired Beijing duck’ is really pretty great and the dim sum is definitely worth getting involved in too.
Capacity: The Mezzanine Dining Area - 12-30
Minimum Spend: £2000
You’ve been put in charge of your sister's engagement party and the only direction you got from her was a lot of head nodding and her repeating ‘nice but casual’ over and over again. Go ahead and book the private dining area at Sager + Wilde. This Bethnal Green railway arch spot is romantic but not overly fussy, has good wine but isn’t too expensive, and serves simple Italian food that still has the odd kick of chilli. You can either go for their cool, candlelit upper mezzanine dining area, or, for summer months, you can also rent out their proper charmer of a terrace for 100 people—price dependent on your date of choice.
Capacity: 18
Minimum Spend £750 for dinner. £350 for lunch.
St John is effectively Disneyland, but with meat. Imagine Thunder Mountain but entirely made out of bone marrow and you’ve got a pretty clear idea of how much grown-up fun you’ll have at London’s original nose-to-tail dining spot near Smithfield. Much like the rest of the restaurant, the private dining room has white walls, white tablecloths, and a simple, classic look.
Capacity: The Shanghai Room - 18. The Beijing Room - 26.
Minimum Spend: The Shanghai Room - from £750 (dinner from £1500). The Beijing Room from £1000 (dinner from £2500).
When it comes to private dining rooms, Hutong is not messing around. This ultra-swish Chinese restaurant is on the 33rd level of the Shard, and has two incredibly extra private dining rooms. Both The Shanghai Room and The Beijing Room have floor to ceiling windows with views of St Paul’s, as well as hand-carved wooden doors, and a whole lot of red lanterns. Come here when you’re really looking to impress. Or just when you’ve got a few grand knocking about your bank account and a penchant for people hand-carving duck at your table.
PRIVATE ROOMS FOR 25+
Capacity: 35
Minimum Spend: dependent on group size and night of the week, but approximately £150 per head
Here’s a sentence that will make you feel like you’ve just entered the Rolex realm. The Rose Room at the Cadogan Arms on the King’s Road is available for private hire. This jaw-dropper of a pub in Chelsea is one of London’s most quaint and charming spots, and the upmarket takes on comforting gastropub classics definitely don’t hurt either. With your own private horseshoe bar, multiple hidden-art TV screens, and access to the nostalgic wonders of the huge rhubarb trifle, it’s a great shout if you’re after somewhere fancy that still hits the cosy mark.
Capacity: Semi-private dining area - 15. Fully private area - 38.
Minimum Spend: Half of semi-private dining area - £3000. Fully private area - £6000.
Decimo is a sexy restaurant. Partially because there’s a lot of mahogany, strong margaritas, and enough foliage to feed an army of Roger Rabbits, but also because this place has some pretty spectacular views across London. The private dining space is technically more of a semi-private, secluded, curtain situation but it’s right next to the floor-to-ceiling windows, and much more importantly, has its own private bar. You should know that this restaurant is very much built for blow-out, mortgage-to-the-wind meals, but the tacos are some of the best in London.
