A new bowling alley and gaming centre in Ipswich is set to open with a New Year’s extravaganza.

Construction at Bears Boutique Bowling in Star Lane, near the Waterfront, will be finishing this month and the managers are planning to throw a celebratory party on New Year’s Eve.

“We are in the last couple of weeks now of the building, we’re just finishing up the work,” said Charlie Manning, proprietor of the new business as well as Manning’s Amusements in Felixstowe.

“We are having a couple of private training events to start off and then on New Year’s Eve we’re having a celebration party which is open to the public.

“The following week we’ll fully open with the kitchen and bar. Up to the first week of the New Year we’ll be doing just bar service. Then in the first full week in January we’ll have the kitchen.”

The centre will be split into two floors and will include five bowling lanes, gaming machines, a cocktail bar, beer bar and an American-style burger diner.

As well as offering people a place to enjoy games, food and drink, there will also be function rooms.

Members of the public have already been taking an interest in Bears, which is set to create about 30 jobs.

“We’ve had about 30 enquiries for Christmas parties and we said we’d try to do them if we could,” said Mr Manning.

“We’ve had car loads of people turning up just thinking we’re open. We’ve had students coming across, loads of people want to organise regular events, people phoning up about the food challenges who are quite keen to win the shirts.

“It’s going to be busy from day dot. The feedback we’ve had has been really good.”