Curradine Barns stands down a lane at Shrawley, in the soft green country between Worcester and the Severn, and it makes its case before you have properly got out of the car. The buildings are 19th-century red brick, once a working farm, and the restoration has been done with a light enough hand that you still read them as barns — oak beams overhead, brick warm enough to put a hand on, flagstones underfoot — rather than as a function room wearing a rustic costume for the day.
The day turns around a courtyard, which is the clever part. You can marry in the Granary Barn, under exposed brickwork and a wrought-iron chandelier with fairy lights strung above you, or outside on the farmhouse lawn beneath the garden gazebo if the forecast is kind. Dinner happens next door in the Barley Barn, where old flagstones and beams meet a contemporary orangery extension that pours light over the tables right through the long part of a summer afternoon. In between, everyone spills into the courtyard with a drink, and by evening the Curradine Cantina — the venue’s own outdoor kitchen — is turning out wood-fired pizzas and barbecue and the sort of food that gets eaten standing up and laughing.
It is an exclusive-use venue, so the place is yours for the day, and the farmhouse keeps your closest people on site with ensuite bedrooms sleeping a good couple of dozen between them. Midsummer Cottage, with its four-poster and private garden, is kept back for the two of you. All of which means nobody is watching the clock for a taxi, and breakfast the next morning is still part of the wedding.
Where the band plays
The Granary Barn is the room that carries the evening, and it is a happy shape for live music: a single volume with height in the roof, the brick and timber giving the sound something to bite on, and a natural end wall to frame a band against. Because the dining happens in the Barley Barn, the dancefloor doesn’t have to be conjured out of a room full of tables at 9pm — the party can be set up and waiting while pudding is still going on, which is worth more to the night than most couples expect.
How the evening runs
Exclusive use here runs from the middle of the day through to midnight, so the shape of things is generous but finite: dinner, speeches, a first dance at a sensible hour and two full sets with the room still packed for the last one. Live music and discos are both welcome, though it is always worth asking at the viewing whether a sound limiter is fitted and where the band should load in across the courtyard — five minutes of conversation that saves an hour on the day.
Bands available in Worcestershire and perfectly at home in a venue like this.
More live music in Worcestershire.
- Worcestershire Wedding Bands
- Worcestershire Events Bands
- Tribute Acts in Worcestershire
- Wedding DJs in Worcestershire
- Corporate Entertainment in Worcestershire
Worth reading before you book: Sound Limiters Explained. More questions answered on our England & Wales FAQs.