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20 date-night ideas to perk up your relationship

Throw caution to the wind and book a babysitter - Alamy
Throw caution to the wind and book a babysitter - Alamy

Rule number one: be imaginative. Challenge your fixed conceptions of what you might enjoy, and even what you might be capable of. A dinner for two at a local restaurant is all very well, but a dinner for two  in total darkness might give you more to talk about. And attempting to escape together from a locked room might be more exciting than failing to escape from the rooms you share all the time.

Here are our suggestions for 20 date nights that should reinvigorate any relationship. Whether this will be your 50th date or your first, throw caution to the wind, leave out an extra biscuit for the babysitter… and enjoy!

Relive your first date

1 Return to the original pub or restaurant, go for that same walk or cycle ride, go for a film and a curry just like you used to. A great way of triggering memories of the good times before the mundanities of real life kicked in. If the old place has gone bust/been closed by the health inspectors or is now under a flyover, re-create it as closely as possible, and give thanks that the quality of British cuisine and cinema seating has improved beyond all recognition since then.

Take a dance class

2 This is especially appropriate if one or both of you hate dancing. Adventurous dating is about embracing your awkwardness and rekindling intimacy, and taking syncopated steps ticks both of those boxes. Search online for local instructors, and choose a dance with a bit of oomph – the tango, say, or the lambada…

dancing - Credit: Westend61
Get up close at a dance class Credit: Westend61

See some art

3 Guaranteed to be a conversation starter – even if you dislike the artist in question. Why not invest in the National Art Pass, which gives free entry to over 240 museums, galleries and historic houses across Britain and half price at major exhibitions? 

Have a cooking lesson

4 A cooking lesson has all the attributes of a good evening: the opportunity to learn something new together, followed by (hopefully) delicious food and wine. In London try The Jamie Oliver Cooking School or The Avenue Cookery School. Further afield there’s Kitchen Table Cookery in Somerset and, in Devon, Ashburton Cookery School.

Enjoy a side-by-side spa

5 Traditionally the go-to resuscitation option for whichever spouse is feeling in need of individual rejuvenation, spa treatments and relaxation-oriented pampering can be a wonderfully intimate experience, with the additional benefit that you will both be feeling unusually attractive afterwards. Ragdale Hall, the luxury spa hotel in Leicestershire, offers Romantic Retreat weekends, as do many other marginally less upscale venues. 

spa - Credit: Alamy
The couple that spa together, stay together Credit: Alamy

Get your heart pumping

6 Research shows that couples who sweat together, stay together. It doesn’t matter what you do – so long as it makes your heart race, as it’s the physiological arousal (sweaty hands, a racing pulse, shortness of breath) rather than the novelty or challenge of the activity that drives romantic attraction, apparently. Try jogging in the park, cycling down the river bank or a game of tennis. Followed by a well-earned dinner at the pub.

Taste some wine

7 An opportunity to enjoy far better wine than usual, while learning something about it. The Wine Society run events across the country and, in London, DVine Cellars’ £25 Wednesday night tastings sell out weeks in advance.

wine - Credit: Getty
Enjoy a shared passion for wine Credit: Getty

Brush up on your language skills

8 Lost in translation? Nearly 10 per cent of marriages in Britain include a foreign-born spouse and research shows that bilingual couples grow closer by sharing their language and culture. Cactus language courses offer classes across the country. 

Walk to dinner

9 Choose an evening when it is unlikely to be hosing down, choose a lovely restaurant on the far side of town, and walk all the way – having worked out the most interesting or scenic route beforehand. If you are rural, take footpaths to an alluring local. Either way, en route you’ll rediscover your area, and each other, and have something to talk about over dinner.

Make chocolates (then eat them)

10 Giving chocolates is a tried and trusted way to gain (or regain) the affections of a loved one. But making the chocolates together – ideally with expert instruction – is more imaginative, more messy and more romantic. Paul A Young offers terrific classes in central London, but chocolatiers and catering schools all over the nation will be happy to help. 

chocolate - Credit: Alamy
Sprinkle some love on your relationship Credit: Alamy

Go and see something funny

11 If you don’t find each other funny any more, a comedy night could be just the answer. Ricky Gervais’s Humanity is touring until October and there are daily listings on chortle.co.uk.

Escape from it all

12 Escaping the room is something that may have appealed to one or both of you on frequent occasions in family life, but for a date night we suggest you get locked up together – in a purpose-designed puzzle room with clues which you will have to work out together in order to be released. A sure-fire bonding experience, as you long as you DO escape… exitgames.co.uk is a blog/map with venues all over Britain.

Take afternoon tea together

13 So much more imaginative than dinner, and also available while the children are at school, if evenings have become rather too dominated by homework or suitable television. Many swanky hotels now offer romantic teas, with champagne an attractive optional extra. 

Do a “lucky dip”

14 If you can’t make your mind up, late fate or chance decide: you can make your own lucky dip or raffle bag, or invest in one of various kits on the market (try notonthehighstreet.com). Another idea is to award tokens to each other for favours in other more mundane areas of life, exchangeable for the date or treat of the token-holder’s choice.  

Go to a lecture

15 It sounds as middle-aged as the phrase “date night” itself, but a political debate or history lecture can incite the kind of conversation that you had when you first fell in love. Make sure you discuss it afterwards over a dinner or drinks, before heading home to real life. See list.co.uk and britac.ac.uk for inspiration.

Have a night at the museum

16 NOT the Ben Stiller movies, but evening events of all sorts at your local museum or palace of culture. A chance to see familiar favourite rooms and objects – and each other – in an entirely new light. A mini-festival of cultural evening events all over the country, Museums at Night, takes place in May, but meanwhile you can improvise… 

gallery - Credit: Corbis
Indulge your culture sides Credit: Corbis

Have dinner afloat...

17 There is something about the moon on the water that brings out the romantic in the most cynical and utterly married soul, and if this can be combined with decent cuisine and moving scenery you have the ideal date-night package. Not every town or city has a navigable canal or harbour, but most can come up with a river or lake. Bon voyage. (thamesdinnercruise.co.uk)

...Or in the dark

18 Hazardous at home, but an adventure in the correct, expertly staffed surroundings. Dans le Noir in Clerkenwell in London is Britain’s most celebrated such restaurant, but the idea has caught on worldwide: delicious surprise dishes (you may choose fish, meat or vegetarian) served in absolute darkness by blind waiting staff. The idea is that completely denying one sense enhances the others. Taste. Smell. Touch… 

Go to the zoo

19 After-hours at the zoo can make for a truly exotic date night, as the sights and sounds of the eco-friendly menagerie are enhanced by dusk and moody lighting – and by the absence of screaming school parties. Get a selfie with the two of you and a giraffe for a standout mantelpiece trophy. Themes and timings vary from venue to venue. 

Put the telly on

20 No, this does NOT mean a takeaway in front of a box set, rather a carefully chosen film or documentary, with a posh ready meal halfway through. Discuss the film afterwards over pudding and coffee rather than falling asleep on the sofa.

 

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