Hotel National Bern rents its Theatersaal for banquets, seminars, weddings, company parties, fashion shows and concerts, with banquet layouts for 72 to 350 guests and theater seating over the stalls and two balconies. The restaurant adds four rooms for 25 to 80 guests, a summer terrace for 100 and an 18th-century vaulted wine cellar for standing drinks. The house stands at Hirschengraben 24 in the center of Bern, two minutes on foot from the main station and close to the Federal Palace.
Seminars and company events
The Theatersaal hosts seminars, political events, company parties and banquets, and the hotel includes useful services with the hire. The Bistro is offered for business meals and closed parties, and the Cheminée-Stübli, with its fireplace, for a quiet business dinner. The former Alhambra cinema in the lower hall has been renovated in a neutral style and now serves as a lecture hall. With the station two minutes away, delegates can arrive and leave by train on the same day, or stay at the hotel.
Weddings and receptions
The Theatersaal is also rented for weddings and private celebrations, with dinner at round or long tables in the stalls and the stage for speeches, a band or a show. Smaller wedding parties and family events fit the Bistro or the Cheminée-Stübli, and a standing aperitif can take place in the vaulted cellar.
Rooms and capacities
In the Theatersaal, the published banquet plans for the stalls seat 72 guests at round tables, or 180, 200 or 350 guests at long tables. For concerts and shows, the seating plan has two blocks of 248 seats in the stalls, 233 seats on the first balcony and 115 in the center of the second, with a foyer, cloakrooms and a separate catering office.
The restaurant rooms are the Gaststube with 70 to 80 seats, the Bistro with 40 to 50 seats and the Cheminée-Stübli with 25 to 30 seats. In summer the Hirschengraben-Park terrace, under old chestnut trees across from the house, seats 100. The Weinkeller, a vaulted cellar from the 18th century, takes 30 people for standing drinks, on reservation.
Accommodation
The hotel has 45 two-star rooms over five floors: singles, doubles, twins, triples and quadruple rooms, facing the street or a quiet covered courtyard. Some single and twin rooms have their shower and toilet across the corridor.
Catering
The kitchen serves Swiss and Bernese specialties and homemade dishes. The banquet documentation lists aperitif bites, skewers, canapés, cold soups and desserts in glasses, with set aperitif selections, and the house also runs themed evenings such as whisky and wine dinners.
History and setting
The foundation stone was laid in 1908 to plans by architect Gottfried Läderach. The Swiss typographers' union built the house, which opened in 1912 as Hotel Monbijou and took the name Hotel National in 1918. Dances were held in the hall from 1953, and after the 1956 renovation it also hosted concerts. The Grünenwald family has run the house since the 1960s and bought it in 1984, and the hall was renovated in 1979.
Getting there
Bern main station is a two-minute walk away. The Federal Palace and the old town are within walking distance.
