Strangers become friends over dinner

Key facts

Founded

Exeter, 2024

Model

Credit-based seats at hosted community dinners (credits from £1)

Where

Exeter, Topsham, Torquay, Totnes and wider Devon

Venues

Independent restaurants — from Magdalen Road favourites to award-winning kitchens

Format

A hosted table where every guest booked to meet new people; everyone pays their own way

About the founder

Dinners With Friends was founded in Exeter by Pamela Silkstone, who built the platform around a conviction the research keeps confirming: shared meals are the oldest and most reliable way humans turn strangers into friends. She is available for comment on loneliness and social connection in the South West, the science of communal eating, and Devon's independent food scene.

Story angles

• The loneliness epidemic, answered locally

  ONS data finds around one in fourteen UK adults feels lonely often or always — and 16–29s report chronic loneliness at twice the rate of over-70s. Dinners With Friends is Exeter's structural answer: repeated, hosted, low-pressure shared tables.

• Come to a dinner

  The best way to understand the format is to sit at a table. We regularly host journalists — email us and we'll save you a seat at the next dinner.

• The science of the shared table

  Oxford research led by Robin Dunbar shows people who eat socially more often are happier, trust more, and have wider support networks. Our founder can speak to how that research translates into a real-world format.

• Independent venues, fuller tables

  Our dinners bring reliable mid-week covers to Devon's independent restaurants — a food-economy story as much as a social one.

Background reading: our evidence page on loneliness in Devon and the science of eating together.

Community & charity partnerships

We work with — and want to hear from — organisations tackling loneliness and social isolation: charities such as Marmalade Trust and the Campaign to End Loneliness, NHS social-prescribing link workers, and Devon community groups. We can offer hosted tables as a referral destination, co-created events, and honest data about what works.

Every dinner is hosted, venues are public and accessible, and guests can reach us before, during and after an event — we take the duty of care around vulnerable and isolated guests seriously. Partnership enquiries: [email protected].

Brand assets

• Logo (PNG)
• Brand card, 1200×630 (JPG)
• Event photography available on request — including journalist-attendance at upcoming dinners.

Media contact

[email protected] — we respond quickly, and yes, you can come to dinner.