The most useful thing to know about playing The Parkgate is that we can do the whole night, not just the slot after dinner. A trio in the restaurant or the bar while guests arrive, then the full band in the Postmaster Suite once everyone sits down - the music follows the event through the building rather than appearing for ninety minutes and disappearing. It is a luxury hotel in Cardiff’s old central Post Office, and it is built for an evening that moves from room to room.
A grand old Post Office on Westgate Street
The Parkgate is a four-star hotel on Westgate Street, a few minutes from Cardiff Central and right against the Principality Stadium, in the city’s grand former Post Office - opened in 1897 for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee and reborn as a hotel in 2021. It is part of The Celtic Collection, the same group as Celtic Manor and ICC Wales, both rooms we are in constantly. The headline event space is the Postmaster Suite, which seats up to 344 for a dinner and comes with its own private bar area, with the smaller Telegraph Room and Mail Room for more intimate dinners and meetings. It is a heritage-luxury room rather than a flat-floor hall, and that character shapes how we play it. It is licensed for weddings as much as corporate events - we cover Parkgate weddings here.
One band, every format in the building
This is what The Parkgate does that a single-room venue cannot. We play the Postmaster Suite as a 5 to 8-piece - the room is a refined, intimate-luxury space rather than a cavernous hall, so it wants a band sized to fill it warmly rather than overpower it, and the 5-to-8 range covers everything from a sit-down dinner with a relaxed first set to a full party once the floor opens. But the booking does not have to stop there. We also play the bar, the restaurant and the other rooms as a solo, a duo or a trio - so the same event can have a pianist or a trio setting the tone over drinks and dinner elsewhere in the hotel, then the full band in the Postmaster Suite for the evening. For a planner that means one supplier covering reception, dinner and party rather than three.
Loading in to a Victorian building
The Postmaster Suite is a beautiful room in a converted 1890s Post Office, and the get-in is honest about the building’s age - not a roll-off-the-truck job, but for a heritage conversion it is better than most. We load through the rear courtyard, in through one of the smaller bar areas and into the side of the room. Vehicle access at the rear is limited, though you can drive up to the courtyard to unload. City-centre parking is tight, so it is worth arranging in advance - the sort of thing a band that has played here sorts before the day rather than circling Westgate Street with a van full of kit.
The Postmaster Suite has no house PA, so the sound and lighting come in for the night. Either we supply our own rig - the kind we run for a larger wedding - or the event’s production company brings the PA and lighting; either way our engineer mixes the band front-of-house. Worth pinning down early so the room is not double-covered for sound.
There is no sound limiter in the Postmaster Suite, but there are bedrooms directly above it, so the levels want managing through the night. We keep the low end in check so the floor stays loud where it counts without the duty manager fielding complaints from upstairs - knowing where that line sits is one of those things that only comes from having played the room.
How an evening runs at The Parkgate
The Postmaster Suite’s private bar is the clever part of the flow. It works as the drinks reception before the evening event, and then doubles as the buffet serving area partway through the night, so the room keeps its own self-contained rhythm without sending guests off down a corridor. Around that, the night runs the way corporate evenings do here - drinks, dinner and any awards or speeches, then the band. We play two roughly hour-long sets blended together and loaded with floor-fillers, with a DJ around them, and run in-ears rather than wedges to keep the stage tidy in a room where guests are close on every side. An awards night puts the band on after the formalities; a Christmas party wants the floor up early. Whichever it is, we want the running order in advance so the buffet, the speeches and the band do not collide.
The Brotherhood are South Wales’ go-to corporate band. Check our availability for your dinner, awards night or Christmas party at The Parkgate Hotel.
