Rage rooms: can smashing stuff up really help to relieve anger and stress?

Venues promoting destruction as stress relief are appearing around the UK but experts – and our correspondent – are unsure

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f you find it hard to count to 10 when anger bubbles up, a new trend offers a more hands-on approach. Rage rooms are cropping up across the UK, allowing punters to smash seven bells out of old TVs, plates and furniture.

Such pay-to-destroy ventures are thought to have originated in Japan in 2008, but have since gone global. In the UK alone venues can be found in locations from Birmingham to Brighton, with many promoting destruction as a stress-relieving experience.

According to Smash It Rage Rooms in south-east London, where a 30-minute solo session costs £50, “each smash is a cathartic release, a burst of pure, primal joy”.