About

Down Hall Hotel Weddings

Dating back to 1322, Down Hall has a wonderful array of rooms and suites to host the most intimate of ceremonies, luxury wedding breakfasts and stunning receptions, most with panoramic views over our beautiful gardens.

Our Chef and his team have created the most delicious menus for your special occasion, using the freshest and finest ingredients either from our own vegetable garden or locally sourced produce, complimented by outstanding personal service from our staff.

Our dedicated Wedding Co-ordinators will guide you through your arrangements from the very first time you contact us, to the moment you take your vows. Every detail is taken care of and they come equipped with lists of recommended suppliers, creative ideas and years of valuable experience to help make your wedding day everything you could have ever dreamed of and more.

Our different wedding reception rooms can cater for parties of different sizes, with our largest room holding 190 guests and our smallest 32. Large windows provide a dramatic outlook onto our landscaped Hertfordshire gardens, creating the perfect backdrop for live music performances and dancing, following your first dinner with your friends and family as husband and wife.

Located just 15 minutes from London Stansted Airport and 45 minutes from central London, Down Hall is ideal for wedding guests arriving from national or international locations.

Planning Your Wedding Day

From an intimate ceremony in our historic Prior Suite, a lavish wedding breakfast in the stylish Bridgeman Suite to the perfect pictures in the extensive gardens, Down Hall provides a magical backdrop to your fairytale wedding. Down Hall is the perfect location to host all the elements of your perfect wedding day or as the venue for the celebrations after your church ceremony. Find Out More

A Warm Welcome Awaits

Why not extend the wedding celebrations to the day before or after the wedding? A warm welcome awaits you and your guests the day prior to the wedding for a welcome dinner with your closest family and friends. On the big day, you can get ready in style with our ‘Bride to Be’ or ‘Groom to Be’ packages. After your wedding day, there is no need to leave straightaway! Keep the celebrations going with a relaxed BBQ or picnic in our beautiful grounds, a comforting Sunday lunch or a decadent afternoon tea. Find Out More

Stay The Night At Down Hall

After celebrating the happiest day of your life with your closest friends and family, in the most beautiful of surroundings, it is time to retire to our newly redecorated bridal suite to reminisce on what has been a perfect wedding day. With 99 bedrooms, there is plenty of room for your loved ones as well so you can meet for breakfast in the morning to relive the day together. Our Down Hall breakfast is either served in our Grill Room restaurant or in a private room for you and your guests. Find Out More

Our Wedding Packages

In order to make the planning of your special day as simple as possible, we have carefully designed a selection of luxury wedding packages including our Prestige Summer, Exquisite Winter, a Midweek and a Sunday wedding package. All our packages include everything you require to make your wedding as memorable as possible and ensure you and your guests are looked after during every part of the day. Find Out More

Unique Offers And Late Availability

Looking for your dream wedding without breaking the bank? Why not have look at our special offers and late availability dates? We will work with you to keep your wedding within your set budget and include the unique wedding planning tool Moposa in all our packages to help you with this. Find Out More

For more information about planning your wedding day at Down Hall contact our Wedding Co-ordinators on 01279 731 441 or complete an enquiry form.

Other features:

Relax the body, soothe the soul and lift the spirit during your stay at Down Hall in our new, luxury Eden Spa. Dating back to 1322, this impressive Italianate mansion is a historic setting. The hotel’s luxury interiors, ornate ceilings and abundance of natural daylight make for an experience like no other.

Take time to wander the 110 acres of surrounding woodland, parkland and landscaped gardens or sample traditional English Afternoon Tea in our historic lounge or Ibbetson’s tearoom. Why not enjoy a leisurely dinner in The Grill Room restaurant, serving modern English cooking prepared with fresh ingredients from our own vegetable garden?

History of Down Hall Country House Hotel

Down Hall, situated on the Hertfordshire/Essex border, is one of England’s longest-established country hotels.  Located in Hatfield Heath, near Bishops Stortford, Down Hall has a history as rich as its luxurious interiors. The stately home itself dates back to 1540, before which it was the site of a monastery, founded in 1322.

In its long and distinguished history, Down Hall has been home to artists, painters, lords and baronets, whose style and aesthetic spirit has rubbed off on the choice of décor today.  All those European Grand Tours, so fashionable when the house was being transformed from its Tudor incarnation, have had an influence on the flamboyant Italianate style of the house.

Of course, the best way to understand the rich past of Down Hall is to stay there. Each of the hotel’s 99 bedrooms has been individually designed to reflect the mix of style, elegance and history that give the Hall its unique character.  The Classic and Executive bedrooms are spacious and comfortable.

The Feature Rooms have luxurious two- or four- poster beds and offer views of the magnificent landscaped gardens through gloriously large windows, fashionable in both Georgian design and the Italian style emulated by the architect, James Gibbs, when he remodelled the house in 1720.

Despite Gibbs’ European influences, Down Hall remains a very British stately home. The Hall ‘did its bit’ during World War One as a convalescent home for wounded soldiers and, from 1932 to 1967, it became Downham School, a girls’ school whose alumni included Frances Shand-Kydd, the mother of Diana, Princess of Wales.  The hotel opened its doors in 1986, giving discerning guests a taste of its now-famous Italian grandeur in the beautiful Hertfordshire countryside.

Down Hall’s corner of that beautiful Hertfordshire countryside comprises 110 acres of woodland, parkland and landscaped gardens for visitors to explore. After all that walking, guests and visitors can take a traditional afternoon tea in either the historic lounge or Ibbetson’s tearoom, named after the family who owned Down Hall from 1794 to 1902.

The more peckish explorer can enjoy a leisurely meal in The Grill Room restaurant, which serves the best of modern English cooking prepared with fresh ingredients from the hotel’s own vegetable garden.

So whether you want to relax and soak up the Hall’s history and enjoy its opulent surroundings, or have a change of scene from the office for your meetings and team days, Down Hall can meet your needs.  Down Hall is an ideal base for business trips, team-building events and conferences.

All of the rooms and public spaces benefit from complementary wi-fi access, enabling the Hall to offer its guests the benefit of modern technology in the midst of truly timeless elegance…