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Winton House has just unveiled its newly refurbished dining room, with its subtle new lighting, a new oak floor and new furnishings, beautifully transformed into a twenty-first century ball room. The dining room has curved Georgian doors and exquisite cornicing, a large bay window overlooking the croquet lawn, views to the front of the House and a welcoming open fire. The flexible spot lighting is perfect for gala dinner awards and presentations. The House’s ancestors — Mary Countess of Elgin, amongst them — are subtly lit and look down approvingly from the walls, ‘grand but on an intimate scale’.
Dining at Winton House has proved popular with a wide range of corporate clients: amongst them Standard Life, Tesco Personal Finance, Cisco Systems, Mercedes Benz, Microsoft, Toyota, PGA of America, Citrix, Pfizer, Avon, New Holland, Lufthansa and leading companies from Spain, France, Germany, Sweden and Russia.
The dining room’s inaugural event was a small dinner in honour of Ellen Collingsworth in April, retiring as the Association’s Manager at the Edinburgh Convention Bureau (ECB). The dinner was attended by colleagues and friends from the city and particularly the Edinburgh Ambassador Programme.
Commenting afterwards, Sue Stuart, the ECB’s Chief Executive, said:
“Winton House was the perfect venue for Ellen’s dinner – and, much like the guest of honour, the newly refurbished dining room is elegant, graceful and extremely charming.”
Sir Francis Ogilvy, owner of Winton House, describes some of the family portraits:
“Where else can you see two Raeburn’s and a Van Dyke on the walls?
“You can also see an image of a lady whose personality and marital activities put modern soap operas in the shade and was captured and imprisoned by the head of a revolution, before bringing the famous Elgin Marbles to Britain.
“Also looking down are the life-size image of an art collector whose purchases unwittingly included ‘The Lost Caravaggio’, bought for under a tenner.”
Dinner guests are welcomed by a piper in full highland regalia. They can kick off an evening at Winton with Champagne in the drawing room or on the front lawn, while enjoying canapés with local Belhaven smoked trout or homemade game pate. A private tour is often provided by Sir Francis Ogilvy, or Rob or Morag from the events team.
The food and ambience is like a dinner party at a friend’s home, lovingly made and beautifully presented but with good sized portions. Winton’s accommodating chefs use as much local, East Lothian produce as possible for their seasonal menus.
Particular favourites from the menus are the ‘haggis and walnut filo parcels with spicy plum sauce’, the ‘rack of lamb with a walnut and herb crust’, ‘Winton roast beef and Yorkshire pudding’ and ‘traditional Scottish steak pie’. Delicious sweets include ‘Amaretto truffle chocolate torte’, ‘lemon posset with passion fruit served with shortbread’ and ‘traditional apple crumble pie’.
The Winton House wine list has grown over the last year, and we now have an extensive selection from France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Chile. After dinner guests can relax in front of the fire in the King Charles Room, glass of Glenkinchie whisky or Brammle liqueur in hand.
More energetic guests round off their evening with one of our signature Winton Ceilidhs (these need to be pre-booked). They can let their hair down, work off dinner, and may be able to persuade Sir Francis Ogilvy and staff to lead the dancing.
As an alternative to a 3 course sit down meal, you can opt for the Grand Buffet or the Winton barbeque, ideal for those less formal dinners or parties during the summer. Barbeques can be held on the peacock balcony overlooking the Loch or on the oval lawn in front of the House.
The dining room can now cater for dinners for up to 84 people seated at round tables. However, the flexible layout of Winton House means the rooms work well for corporate dinners for 10 to 120 guests. Small groups can be catered for in the intimacy of the Cabinet Room or even in the timeless, atmosphere of the fifteenth century Vaulted Cellar.
Larger groups of visitors can use the dining room, Cabinet Room and the Octagon together for up to 120 guests. A marquee can be constructed on the croquet lawn adjacent to the house for parties of up to 400.
For more information, please contact Christopher Lamotte on 07957 870071 or Morag Morrison, Events and Marketing Manager, at Winton House on 01875 340222 or by email at morag@wintonhouse.co.uk.
