London’s Best Private Dining Rooms

Maximum Capacity: 14

Minimum Spend: set menu starts at £55 per person

Bermondsey’s Cafe Murano nails the fine balance of being fancy but not uptight, and classy but not too polished. The Italian spot has a discreet private dining room that feels separate to the restaurant. Tucked away in here—getting into a huge pork chop bathing in salty anchovy butter sauce—is a great place to be. The warm and attentive staff will look after you well too.

Maximum Capacity: The Garden Room 8 / The Pasta Room 10 / The Terrace 20

Minimum Spend: Prices available upon enquiry

We’ve had dreams about a place called The Pasta Room, but they mostly involved Jeff Goldblum hand-feeding us tagliatelle. Sadly, Jeff isn’t part of the private dining package at upmarket Italian spot Luca in Farringdon. But they do have a room that’s designed to look and feel like a rustic Italian home kitchen, where chefs make fresh pasta. There’s also The Garden Room that overlooks the open kitchen, with enough foliage and warm lighting to make it London’s most romantic private dining room.

Maximum Capacity: 10

Minimum Spend: £500, and a £250 deposit on reservation. Minimum spend increases to £1000 over the festive period.

Noble Rot serves some of the best bread in London. Plus some delightful slip soles, deeply sexy leather banquette seating, and an award-winning wine list. 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 a la carte, or if you’re rolling with more than six people, choose a set menu of its modern European dishes, or a reduced a la carte menu.

Maximum Capacity: 16 for Downstairs Private Dining Room / 30 for Rear Dining Room

Minimum Spend: Downstairs Private Dining Room £250 / Rear Dining Room £500

Bao Noodle Shop is great at everything they do. If they were a person we’d find this wildly annoying, but when it comes to moreish buns, signature umeshu Negronis, and achingly cool branding, you can’t beat them. The low-key Taiwanese noodle shop is a short walk away from Shoreditch High Street station, and has two entertainment rooms for hire. Whether you opt for the large private dining room with Akari light sculptures or the space where you can play your own music is up to you and how tolerant you are of your mate’s attempt to hit Whitney Houston’s high notes.

Maximum Capacity: 12

Minimum Spend: £500, minimum spend increases to £750 during the festive period

With a big wooden oval table, wild flowers in old milk bottles, and a vintage rug, Soho’s 10 Greek Street is basically like entertaining at home. But with chefs who can cook much better than you, a decadent feasting menu, and an interior designer’s touch. To feel like the top host you are (kind of), ask for their ‘black book’—a handwritten list of rare wines to match the seasonal French food.

Maximum Capacity: 10

Minimum Spend: Varies on the day, time, and season

The private dining options at Mayfair’s Gymkhana aren’t rooms, they’re vaults (and one has a wine cellar). 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 excellent contemporary Indian set menus, recommended florists, music options, and their cocktail lounge, 42, is open until 2am—you can also rent it.

Maximum Capacity: 6 for The Jungli Room 6 / 10 for The Tamasha Room/ 12 for The Raja Rani Room

Minimum Spend: The Jungli Room from £600 at dinner / The Tamasha Room from £800 at dinner / The Raja Rani Room from £1200 at dinner

Fellow JKS restaurant Ambassador’s Clubhouse offers more options if the Gymkhana vaults are booked up or you need more space. Each private room at this Mayfair restaurant is inspired by the party mansions of India—think chandeliers, gold tables, clashing fabrics, and DJ booths. From the warm service the moment you enter to the desi bangers, this is a fun restaurant. And it’s perfect for big celebrations—there’s an even bigger space that seats up to 60.

Maximum Capacity: 12

Minimum Spend: none but set menu starts at £45 per person for dinner 

Bancone in Covent Garden is all about handmade, fresh pasta. Their private dining room has distressed wood, rustic walls, and that rural Italian look. And the four-course £45 feasting menu features everything from whipped cod roe and fried artichoke with romesco, to their must-order silk handkerchief dish (think deconstructed lasagne with walnut butter). It’s a very decent, affordable option, but the intimate space is probably better suited to an engagement party, birthday, or family celebration than an outing with colleagues.

Maximum Capacity: The Bidi Room 16 / The Kukri Room 10 / The Pot Luck Room 22

Minimum Spend: The Bidi Room from £1200 at dinner / The Kukri Room from £600 at dinner / The Pot Luck Room from £1800 at dinner

Indian restaurant and grown-up playground Brigadiers in the City has four sit-down private dining rooms. 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. The Tap Room is a moody, tavern-style space. And The Pot Luck Room has old-school ceiling fans and a help-yourself drink station. There’s also The Pool Room, which is standing-and-stools-only, but it does have a pool table and whisky vending machine. There are also spaces that seat up to 55, and you can book the whole venue for 200 guests.

Maximum Capacity: 14

Minimum Spend: none but the feasting-style menu starts at £75 per person

The time has finally come. After eight years of hard work, your mate has finally been promoted to Chief Nail Polish Naming Officer. A day this proud deserves the private dining room at old-school British spot Quality Chop House. The Clerkenwell space is sophisticated in a deep-grey, brooding way, with candelabras, flowers, and dainty crockery. Expect a sharing menu with an excellent cut of meat as the centrepiece, plus snacks like pork and prune terrine and mangalitza croquettes.

Maximum Capacity: Semi Private Vaults 10

Minimum Spend: Semi Private Vaults £150 at lunch, £200 at dinner

Hoppers, an excellent Sri Lankan spot in Marylebone, has two private dining options. There’s their downstairs semi-private candlelit vaults that reignited our love of booths, or the option to rent the whole lower ground floor for 65 people. Whether you go for a birthday party involving the 42-hour roast lamb shoulder or a cool, original engagement party, their signature hoppers are a must-order, as is the bone marrow varuval. You can hire the whole restaurant out for 90 guests, too.

Maximum Capacity: Semi-private table on ground floor 20 / whole of lower ground floor 34

Minimum Spend: Two-course set menus are £35 per person

The Laundry in Brixton is proof that not all private dining rooms require a remortgage. This relaxed Antipodean spot is an affordable alternative for anyone who likes the sound of mint green banquettes, artfully exposed brickwork, and tiramisu for the table. Laid-back birthdays or boozy brunches work best in this chilled spot.

Maximum Capacity: 16

Minimum Spend: £1000 at lunch / £1500 at dinner

French and British classics meet upscale Russian touches at Soho spot Bob Bob Ricard. The restaurant has quite the private dining room—think The Last Supper 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 restaurant with a press-for-champagne button and glistening beef wellingtons? 

Maximum Capacity: 24

Minimum Spend: Set menus from £55 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 Drury Lane. It’s warm, intimate, and classy, with an open kitchen where chefs will prepare your group’s set feasting menu of Barrafina classics.

Maximum Capacity: 18 

Minimum Spend: £1500 at dinner  / £500 at breakfast

There are few things more sensual than the words “salon privé”. However, a close runner-up is “comté gougères”. You’ll find both at Maison François, a warm, stylish French restaurant in Mayfair where the private dining room is a glass-fronted wine cellar. 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.

Maximum Capacity: 20

Minimum Spend: £50 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.

Maximum Capacity: 20 

Minimum Spend: None

Mangal II is a cool and casual Turkish restaurant in Dalston that mixes the old with the new. Expect superb grilled meats, sourdough pide, low-intervention wines, and more. You can hire out the basement for a warm evening of fun with your own pre-arranged menu of things like mackerel pide and must-order ocakbasi-grilled razor clams.

Maximum Capacity: 25 

Minimum Spend: £2200 plus 12.5% service charge

Café Deco 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 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 moody lighting.

Maximum Capacity: 16

Minimum Spend: £750 for lunch / £950 for dinner

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 in Farringdon. Much like the rest of the British restaurant, the private dining room has white walls, white tablecloths, and a simple, classic look.

Maximum Capacity: Shanghai 18 (across two tables) / Beijing 26 (across two tables)

Minimum Spend: Shanghai from £1000 / Beijing from £1500

Hutong is an ultra-swish Chinese restaurant on the 33rd level of the Shard, with two incredibly extra private dining rooms. Both the Shanghai and Beijing private dining rooms have floor-to-ceiling windows with views of St Paul’s Cathedral, 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 spare few grand knocking about your bank account and a penchant for tableside hand-carving of peking duck.

Maximum Capacity: 35 

Minimum Spend: Dependent on number of guests, night of the week, and time of year 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 charming spots, and the upmarket takes on gastropub classics—like the beef and Guinness pie—definitely don’t hurt either. With your own private horseshoe bar, multiple hidden-art TV screens, and access to the huge rhubarb trifle, it’s a great shout if you’re after somewhere fancy that still feels warm and comfy.

Maximum Capacity: 38 

Minimum Spend: £3000 for up to 15 people (half of the semi-private dining area), or £6000 for 50 people standing 

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 also has some pretty spectacular views across London. The private dining space is 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 Spanish- and Mexican-inspired restaurant is very much built for blow-out, mortgage-to-the-wind meals.

Maximum Capacity: 40 seated 

Minimum Spend: £1200 minimum spend, set menus start at £45

If you want your private event to be all about mezze, convincing plastic foliage, and friendly people smiling like they just encountered their first ever labradoodle, then look no further than Lemonia. This old-school Greek restaurant in Primrose Hill is big on family gatherings and has sharing and set menus that are both around the £45 mark. Expect lots of lamb, grilled fish, halloumi, baklava, and plenty of vegetarian options.

Maximum Capacity: 14 or 60 for exclusive, private hire of the first floor

Minimum Spend: Dinner set menu starting from £75

Your colleague who has spent the last two years taking every single one of your pens and accusing you of stealing their Splenda is finally leaving, and now you’re being promoted. Bloody hell, you’re excited. When you’re looking for a big-deal private dining space, there’s Scott’s Richmond, a glamorous seafood restaurant in Richmond overlooking the river. Their group booking space (still set within the restaurant) seats up to 14, but you can also go all out with exclusive, private use of the first floor, which seats 60.

Maximum Capacity: 54 

Minimum Spend: from £4000 

Sometimes booking a private dining space is about getting together with your mates or colleagues. And sometimes, booking a private dining space is just about showing people that you’re really bloody cool. Bistrotheque in Bethnal Green is a neighbourhood bistro inside an old warehouse, and their private dining room The Cockatoo includes a sound system, projector, bar, private kitchen, and a 1930s baby grand piano. See, cool.