Tucked into a fold of the Hambleden Valley a few miles above Henley-on-Thames, Old Luxters is the sort of place you reach down a lane so narrow you begin to suspect you have taken a wrong turn — and then the barn appears, brick and flint and beautifully kept, with vines falling away down the slope behind it. The site belongs to Chiltern Valley Winery, Brewery & Vineyard, and that matters more than it might sound. You are not booking a barn that happens to stand in a field; you are booking a corner of a working wine estate that has been opening its doors to celebrations since 1990, in a stretch of the Chilterns that carries an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty designation and thoroughly earns it.
The barn itself is 18th century and has been converted with an admirably light hand, so the timber frame and the great sweep of the roof still do most of the talking. There is a reception space, a proper bar, and a raised gallery looking down over the floor below. Rather wonderfully, the acoustics were taken seriously from the outset and the building has been used for opera in its time, which is not a sentence you get to write about many converted barns. Beyond the doors, the orchard will take a stretch marquee, and the vineyard is there as a backdrop for photographs.
You can marry in the barn, in the farmhouse drawing room, or outside in front of the vines between April and October. Catering is looked after in house, with the estate’s own wines and beers on the bar — a lovely touch when the label on the bottle was made 100 yards from where you are standing. Old Luxters Farmhouse sleeps 10, so a small band of favourite people can stay the night and wander down to breakfast. Around 114 sit comfortably for the wedding breakfast, rising to roughly 150 in the room once the evening guests arrive.
Where the band plays
Live music goes on the main barn floor, with the gallery above and the bar off to one side, and the proportions of the room do a great deal of the work for you. That high timber roof gives a band body and warmth rather than the hard slap you sometimes get in a long modern space, so a five- or six-piece fills it without anyone having to push. An acoustic duo or a jazz trio will sound just as at home over dinner. Access is down a country lane, so it is worth giving your musicians the postcode and a friendly warning about the last half mile; there is parking on site and the walk from the yard to the barn floor is mercifully short.
How the evening runs
With no close neighbours to worry about, Old Luxters is unusually relaxed about volume, which is a genuine luxury in a barn venue and means a band can play at its natural level rather than a polite imitation of it. The licence runs late, though in practice evenings here tend to wind up around midnight, so the last set lands while the floor is still full and nobody has started hunting for their coat. Couples often use the interval for a wander out among the vines as the light goes, then bring everyone back in for the final push.
Bands available in Oxfordshire and perfectly at home in a venue like this.
More live music in Oxfordshire.
- Oxfordshire Wedding Bands
- Oxfordshire Events Bands
- Tribute Acts in Oxfordshire
- Wedding DJs in Oxfordshire
- Corporate Entertainment in Oxfordshire
Worth reading before you book: Sound Limiters Explained. More questions answered on our England & Wales FAQs.