Knebworth House & Barns takes conferences, seminars, awards ceremonies, exhibitions and weddings for groups from a boardroom meeting of 30 to a standing reception of 300, with a 250-acre park for larger ground events. The venue combines four barns with three rooms inside Knebworth House, the Gothic home of the Lytton family, on the edge of Knebworth village near Stevenage in Hertfordshire.
Seminars and company events
The corporate offer covers conferences and seminars, exhibitions, awards ceremonies and events in the grounds. A team of event planners works with each client from the first brief to the day itself. The venue publishes a set of delegate packages: a classic and a signature day delegate package, a half-day package with lunch, a breakfast package, and packages for charity events, award ceremonies and banqueting. For a plenary session, the Manor Barn seats 180 theater style and the Cobbold Barn 150. The park itself is licensed for up to 14,999 people and has hosted festivals and large concerts, which makes it a candidate for a staff festival or a brand event on open ground.
Weddings and receptions
The House and Barns are licensed for ceremonies. Couples can marry outdoors at the garden gazebo in the formal gardens, which seats 150. Wedding breakfasts seat from 50 to 150 guests, and the barns host evening parties for up to 250. The main wedding package applies to any day of the week from 80 guests and includes a three-course wedding breakfast, a drinks reception, white linen and chiavari chairs, a menu tasting and a dedicated coordinator. Smaller weddings are also offered, with more flexibility on numbers.
Rooms and capacities
The Manor Barn and the Lodge Barn are 16th-century buildings. The Manor Barn, 162 square meters, seats 150 for a banquet or a dinner dance, 100 cabaret style and 60 boardroom style; with the Lodge Barn next door, standing receptions reach 300. The Cobbold Barn, a newer oak-framed barn of 223 square meters with its own garden, seats 200 for a banquet and holds 300 standing. The Lytton Barn, 94 square meters, is the smallest barn and also has a private garden. Inside the house, the Jacobean Banquet Hall seats 60 for dinner and 100 theater style, and the Victorian Library and the Edwardian Dining Parlour can be added; house rooms may carry an extra hire charge. Outdoors, the Cobbold Garden, the Sunken Lawn and the gazebo each take 300 standing.
Catering
Food and drink are sold through the venue's own packages, with sample menus, a banqueting menu and a three-course charity dinner menu available on request.
History and setting
Sir Robert Lytton bought the manor in 1490 and began a courtyard house around 1500. Most of it was taken down in 1813, and from 1843 the novelist and politician Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton added the domes, turrets, gargoyles and stained glass that give the house its Gothic outline. Edwin Lutyens later advised the family on the house and gardens. The park opened to visitors in 1971 and became known for open-air rock concerts.
Getting there
The estate sits at Junction 7 of the A1(M), about 29 miles north of London, with free parking for cars and coaches. Stevenage station, two miles away, has non-stop trains from London King's Cross about every 30 minutes and a taxi rank outside. Luton Airport is 11 miles away and Stansted 28 miles.
