SLANE CASTLE 31.12.26
For one night, reality is optional.
On October 31st, The Ritual leaves the city and takes over Slane Castle on New Years Eve — an old country estate given over to music, feasting, performance, fire and the surreal until late.
Inspired by the great masquerades, surrealist gatherings and extravagant private parties of another era, The Ritual is built around the idea of stepping through the gates and leaving the ordinary behind.
This is no ordinary New Years Eve party.
More a midnight gathering at a country estate where things have become slightly unhinged.
A place where the beautiful and the strange sit comfortably beside one another.
Where dinner becomes theatre.
Where performers and guests become difficult to distinguish.
Where you might find yourself having your future read in one room, watching fire illuminate the gardens in another, before disappearing into a packed dancefloor somewhere beyond the trees.
Nothing is quite where you expect it to be.
And not everything will be explained.
THE ESTATE
As daylight fades, Burtown House begins its transformation.
The house, gardens, barn and surrounding grounds will become a series of worlds to move between throughout the night.
There is no prescribed route.
Guests are encouraged to wander.
Open a door.
Disappear.
Throughout the estate, walkabout performers and strange characters will move amongst the crowd, appearing without introduction and becoming part of the night around them.
Magicians will perform at close quarters.
Hidden away from the main party, tarot readers will be waiting for those who want to know a little more about what lies ahead.
Outside, fire breathers and fire performers will emerge against the darkness of the grounds.
Some performances will be impossible to miss.
That is intentional.
THE BANQUET
For a limited number of guests, The Ritual begins before the party.
Inside Burtown House, guests will gather around long tables for The Ritual Banquet — a three-course feast marking the beginning of the evening.
Low light. Candles. Wine. Food. Performance.
Familiar faces seated beside strangers.
The atmosphere gradually shifting as the evening moves on.
Inspired by the theatrical dinner parties and surrealist gatherings of the past, the banquet is intended to feel slightly removed from reality — elegant, decadent and just strange enough to make you question where the dinner ends and the performance begins.
Then the plates disappear.
The doors open.
And the night changes.
NO TWO PEOPLE WILL HAVE THE SAME NIGHT
That's the idea.
The Ritual isn't a show to stand back and watch.
It's a world you enter.
Some will come for dinner.
Some for the music.
Some will spend the night dancing.
There will be moments designed for hundreds of people.
And others designed for one.
Not every performance will be announced.
Not every space will reveal itself immediately.
Not every question will get an answer.
The curious tend to find more.
THE RITUAL AFTER DARK
Beyond the banquet, the estate comes alive.
At the centre of the night is a carefully curated programme of DJs and live artists, occupying spaces across Burtown House until late.
But there is deliberately no single focal point.
Move away from the dancefloor and something else is happening.
Characters drift between rooms.
A magician takes a seat beside you.
A tarot reader turns over a card you wish they hadn't.
Fire cuts through the darkness outside.
A performance begins without announcement and disappears almost as quickly.
You may find a room you weren't looking for.
You may never find it again.
The Ritual is designed around these moments — the things that happen between the things you came to see.
A MODERN NEW YEARS EVE
The Ritual takes its cues from the legendary masquerades and surrealist balls of the past — gatherings where art, fashion, theatre, music and excess collided behind closed doors.
But this is not historical recreation.
The theme is masquerade ball.
Instead, guests are invited to interpret the night themselves.
Dress with intent.
Elegant. Strange. Beautiful. Severe. Surreal.
Wear a mask. Wear Halloween Themed Fancy Dress.
Become someone else entirely.
For one night, nobody is asking too many questions.