There's a kind of milestone birthday that doesn't suit a party. You don't want a function room and a DJ, and you don't want to spend the evening greeting people at a door. What you want is the twenty or so people who actually matter, in one place, with good food and nobody watching the clock. A function room gives you three hours and a hard stop. Taking a whole house gives you the weekend: Friday arriving and settling in, Saturday for the day out and the meal and the night, and Sunday morning with everyone together again before people drift off — which is often the bit people remember most fondly. The dining room sits open to the bar, with everyone around one long table, which is a rare thing in adult life and worth a bit of staging. There's a licensed bar you stock yourselves, and a snug off it with a fire for when the group naturally splits into a loud half and a quiet half, which it always does. The same format works for anniversaries, family reunions with relatives flying in, christenings and communions, and retirement gatherings.