2023 at Lucardo Rawtenstall

Well well well, another year is coming to a close. We hope 2023 has been as full of fun, escapes, achievements and adventures for you as it has been for us!

In the true spirit of the season, we wanted to do a nice roundup of 2023 here at Lucardo Rawtenstall - a festive “round robin”, if you will. Keep reading to catch up on all of our news – it sure has been a busy year!

First of all, 2023 brought great celebration and excitement for us at Lucardo, as we marked our fifth birthday here in Rawtenstall. In June, we were proud to celebrate this anniversary milestone with banners, balloons, special offers and more, and it was a wonderful way to mark a half-decade here in the Rossendale valley. Here’s to many more ahead!

If you’re a regular reader of the Lucardo Blog (which we hope you are!), you’ll no doubt have seen a recent post we shared, highlighting all our recent award wins and nominations. We’re so proud of all these achievements we’ve accomplished in 2023 and, while we won’t go into detail again here, we’d love for you to read all about them in the blog post here.

Another fun occasion was marked back in March, which saw the return of the annual NERD event. Held in Stockport and hosted by Lucardo, this fabulous evening brought together a huge group of escape room owners and enthusiasts alike, all sharing a love of the industry in a fun night of games, drinks, banter… and even a spot of karaoke.

We’re currently in the midst of planning the next NERD event for 2024, which will include the first ever Lock & Key Awards ceremony. You can read more about our plans for this here, and be sure to stay tuned to the blog for more updates as it creeps nearer!

Of course, a Lucardo year would be amiss if it didn’t include a lot of escapes, and all our staff have enjoyed adding lots more wins to our lists over the past few months. As a team, we had fun playing games including The Vault at Breakout Manchester, Crux at The Escaporium, and Orphanage at Lucardo Manchester – all of which have reviews for you to read right here on the blog. We can’t wait to escape many more games in 2024 – so do let us know if you have any recommendations on where to try next!

The summer was a very exciting time for us, as Lucardo fever swept over to Blackburn! Especially for the school holidays, Lucardo teamed up with Blackburn BID to create “The Escapade” – a free, fun-filled family puzzle trail that took players around the town centre, solving missions on a quest to help Professor Lucardo. We were thrilled to see so many families enjoy this unique activity, allowing us to welcome new escape room fans to the hobby.

However, at the end of summer, Lucardo suffered a tragic loss as we bid farewell to one of our original escape rooms, Safe House. Locking up the police station for the final time, we were sorry to see the end of this long-loved game, along with its unique puzzles and characters such as Tommy Neil, Turkish Tony, and of course the maintenance staff that never remembered to fix that table leg.

But all was not lost for long as, in November, we were overjoyed to be able to open a brand-new escape room! Seriously Elfish is the second Christmas-themed game here at Lucardo, and it has made us ever so pleased to see so many teams enjoy the festive experience throughout this Christmas period. If you’ve not played it yet yourself, be sure to book in before the season comes to an end!

In terms of staffing, our directors were proud to promote our wonderful Adam up from Game Host to Centre Manager back in July. We all think he’s been doing a wonderful job, and we’re sure you’ll have seen him around if you’ve played with us this year! Furthermore, in August we celebrated our Game Host Alex smashing his A Levels and getting into university. We’re thrilled to confirm that he still comes back to visit us when he’s home! As well as Adam and Alex, we’ve of course still got Ellen, Mads, and Georgia all here to host your games, championed by our directors Molly and Simon, and not forgetting our favourite receptionist Daisy the dog.

2023 has been a wonderful year for us here at Lucardo, and we can’t wait for many more adventures and escapes ahead in 2024. As always, be sure to stay tuned to the blog for all our latest news and updates, and we hope to lock you up very soon in the new year.

Here’s to 2024!

Written by Madeleine Lily

To book your next escape room adventure in Manchester or Rawtenstall, visit lucardo.com. For any queries, you can call us on 01706 551600. Be sure to also stay tuned to our Facebook and Instagram, as well as the blog, for many more fun insights, news, giveaways, and more!