Hen Do Ideas

Hi Phoebe,

I just had my hen weekend last weekend. I organised it myself months ago. We rented a townhouse on the seafront. Bought lots of food to cook and drinks. There were 4 of us. We stayed in half the time and the other half we went to local places - pubs and restaurants.

Friends surprised me by decorating the place before I arrived. Nice little touch.

I'm from the 'older' generation so didn't want to go on a pub crawl or anything as none of us are big drinkers. However, we had a good time staying in making Pimms and lemonade, drinking wine and and tequila and baileys late into the early hours of the morning.

I had considered staying in London and going out on a Saturday evening to watch Magic Mike or some sort of strip show and go drinking but it can get expensive.

I just wanted to spend time with close friends.

As for budget, if you can get a big house and many to people to share, it won't be too expensive. I found it cheaper than going abroad which I had also considered.

Hope you have a good hen party no matter what you choose to do.

Budget and location really depend on those you are inviting - where they live and how much they can afford to spend.

If you have a range of ages/tastes, your best bet is probably to have a range of events during the day and accept that some people may only come to part of the day. One of my friends booked a self-catering cottage for 5 of us to stay the Friday and Saturday nights and then had other friends come just for the day on Saturday - she started off with a walk, followed by lunch, then a pottery painting afternoon. After that, anyone who wanted to could come back to the cottage to chill out together before we all headed into the nearby town for dinner. Some people just came for part of the day and others came for all of it.

If you have a lot of people coming from a distance, you probably need to book somewhere to stay over, but otherwise, there's no reason why you can't just have a hen do that lasts a day or even just an evening. Other hen dos I've been to that have had a range of tastes/ages have included:

1) Jewellery making afternoon with afternoon tea followed by a meal out in the evening.

2) A weekend with a mobile beautician coming to the accommodation to do facials/manicures etc for those who wanted them while everyone else chilled out, followed by a walk and then everyone prepared, cooked and ate a meal together. The next day we had another walk, a mooch round the shops (cute little seaside town) and a meal out in the evening.

3) A meal in a local restaurant

4) One of my cousins had an afternoon of circus skills for her younger and more flexible friends before meeting up with the rest of us for a meal in the evening.

My plan for my hen is just me and my MOH having a spa weekend. This has always been my plan, long before meeting the one. My other half will arrange some "lad fun".

Otherwise, we are going to have some joint drinks with our friends in our local bar (where we met) and order some food for everybody

You need to do something that is right for you. A friend of mine had an afternoon tea, but the teapots were filled with cocktails. So it was a fun afternoon of cocktails, but no "heavy drinking" pressure.