Altes Zollhaus can host seminars, company parties and wedding receptions for up to 120 guests in its largest room, with two smaller rooms for 30 and 24. The venue is a privately run hotel, restaurant and café at Hauptstraße 5 in Rinteln, a town on the Weser in Lower Saxony, set in a listed building that began life as a customs station in 1804.
Seminars and company events
The house sells meeting days with catering built in. Coffee breaks come with cake from the in-house patisserie and savory snacks, lunch is served as a light buffet, and the day can end with dinner in the restaurant. A seminar room with plenty of daylight is used for working sessions, and the larger Saal can take a plenary group. For company celebrations, the team adapts the menu, drinks, decoration and music to the brief and the budget, from a summer barbecue to a classic Christmas goose dinner. Staff can also visit a company's offices to plan the event in person. A dedicated Christmas party offer runs each winter.
Weddings and receptions
Weddings and family celebrations take place in the same three rooms. The Saal has floor-to-ceiling windows looking over the Weserbergland hills, air conditioning for long evenings and its own sun terrace, where guests can gather for sparkling wine and finger food before dinner. The room is kept plain on purpose, so couples can decorate it as simply or as fully as they like. The site does not say whether civil ceremonies can be held on the premises.
Rooms and capacities
- Saal: up to 120 guests, air conditioning, large windows, private sun terrace.
- Münchhausen Raum: up to 30 guests, suited to a board meeting or a private dinner.
- Wintergarten: up to 24 guests, part of the restaurant area.
The restaurant and bar were fully renovated in 2021.
Accommodation
Bedrooms are on site, so a two-day seminar or a wedding party can stay overnight without transfers. Room types range from Standard double and Superior single rooms to a Superior double with king-size bed, a Junior Suite and a Suite. The total number of rooms is not stated on the site. A breakfast buffet is served each morning, and the hotel also sells cycling, hiking and dog-friendly packages, which can suit an incentive stay in the Weser valley.
Catering
All food comes from the house kitchen: restaurant menus, set menus for groups, buffets, barbecues, and homemade cakes and Belgian waffles from the patisserie and garden café.
History and setting
The building was put up in 1804 under the Elector of Hesse as a customs post on the border between Hesse, Schaumburg and Westphalia, and it is now a protected monument. In 1816 Carl Ludwig Reese and his wife Amalie bought it and turned it into the Gasthaus Reese. The poet Franz von Dingelstedt is said to have written the Weserlied here in 1835, and the house still displays a handwritten copy on parchment. Helmut Luthe bought the inn in 1975 and reopened it as a hotel, restaurant and café after renovation and extension.
Getting there
Altes Zollhaus stands on Hauptstraße in Rinteln, overlooking the Weser valley. Rinteln has a railway station on the regional line between Löhne and Hildesheim, and Hannover airport is the closest international airport, about an hour away by road.
