Harry Potter themed wizarding tearoom opens in Sheffield - with 3,000 bookings already

And it’s true; the newest addition to Broomhill’s high street truly is a bit magical.

After months of lockdown, stepping through the doorway of The Steel Cauldron is a feast for the eyes - with beautiful colours, twinkly lights, and a flurry of flying books.

I spot a tree growing in the corner, dripping with feathers and jewels, a splendid piano tucked into another nook, surrounded by cosy leather wingback chairs, and cabinets of fascinating items.

There are battered suitcases stacked on the floor, photographs stuck to the ceiling - and, are those wands I see? I don’t know where to begin.

“That’s what we were going for,” Rob laughs, as he invites me to take a seat in one of many fantastically mismatched chairs.

The Steel Cauldron - a wizarding themed tea-room and family experience - opened on July 31, and has already had well over 3,000 bookings for the month of August.

“I think people were ready for some magic, after the year we’ve had so far,” explains Rob, who launched the business, along with wife Nikki, on the site of the former Blues Bar, and South Sea Live music venue.

“When we first promoted the website last month, we got 1,000 thousand subscriptions in a day.

“Once we were ready to launch our Wizards Tea, we emailed those 1,000 people, and got 700 bookings in an hour, so there’s definitely an appetite for what we’re doing here.”

But their journey to opening has been anything but smooth, after the country went into lockdown just two weeks after the couple signed the lease.

“It’s true, we signed the lease on March 11, and then the world stopped,” says Rob, who lives with his family in Crookes, but says he barely made it home in the five weeks before opening.

“We had a derelict building that needed complete refurbishment, and very little access to materials or tradesmen, so we had to get creative.

“We’ve done nearly all of the work ourselves, with the help of some fantastic volunteers, and it’s meant that we’ve taken on things we never would have done before lockdown.

“My wife and I laid the cement floor ourselves, Nikki fitted her first light, and I wired my first plug.

“All of the time we’ve invested here as a family has given us the opportunity to fall even more in love with the building.”

The concept for The Steel Cauldron, I’m told, came from the family’s love of magic.

“Nikki loves Harry Potter, and I love Lord of the Rings,” says the dad-of-two.

“We’d visited a small magic themed cafe once, and there were two hour queues outside with people waiting for a table.

“Sheffield seems like the ideal city for somewhere like this, and we thought that if we could really nail the theme and the venue, this idea could really have wings.”

In addition to the food and drinks served at The Steel Cauldron, the couple have big plans for, what they call, ‘experiential retail.’

“At a time where people can buy anything they want online, businesses like ours are working hard to ensure that we’re providing an experience along with our goods,” Rob explains.

“We’re planning a VR area, a Legozone, and an offering of really cool interactive workshops - like wand-making and potion-brewing.

“We have a bar license too, and eventually we’d love to introduce live music.”

The piece-de-resistance of the building is upstairs - a Harry Potter-themed apartment the family plans to hire out for crazy magical sleepovers.

I’m told it’s not quite ready yet, but manage to wangle a quick tour.

As Rob heads up the stairs ahead of me, a brick wall gives way to an entrance which opens up into...Diagon Alley. It’s a jaw-dropping moment.

“Welcome to The Steel Wizards Rest,” says Rob, looking around the space like a kid in a candy shop.

“We couldn’t think of anything better for Harry Potter fans than entering the apartment and finding themselves in the middle of Diagon Alley.

“It’s a three-bedroom, eight-bed space, with a living area, dining area and kitchen.

“It has a home cinema, popcorn maker, and themed bedrooms.”

The family’s love, effort, and attention to detail seeps out of the walls - both upstairs and down.

“It’s definitely been a labour of love,” Rob confirms with a nod.

“Our research every step of the way has come down to, ‘would we want to do this with our own family?’ If the answer is yes, we’ve gone for it.”

In the end, the couple decided to open the tearoom on July 31 - in a nod to what would be Harry Potter’s 40th birthday.

“It was the perfect date, so once we’d committed to it, it was all hands on deck to get us open in time,” Rob says.

“We have fantastic staff here, who all came on board first as volunteers, and they’ve fallen in love with the place as much as we have; helping to paint the walls, fix stars on the ceiling, and create book and art displays.”

For now the tearoom will be limiting its numbers to 45 covers at a time, to ensure everyone can be seated socially distanced.

Rob adds: “It sounds cheesy, but Nikki and I said from the beginning that our intention was to create somewhere that would make people - including us - happy.

“We’d much rather create something crazily spectacular and fail, than something average which succeeds...of course, our hope is to create something super spectacular that’s a big hit, so fingers crossed!”

Visit thesteelcauldron.co.uk