The Union Club

The Union Club occupies 50 Greek Street, a Georgian townhouse put up in 1736 by a local carpenter, William Frith, who built six houses to one pattern. It is the last of the six still standing, and it is listed. Pete Cross and Carolyn Dawson took the building on after a fire and opened the club in 1993 with fifty members. It has grown slowly since, took the building next door in 2015, and keeps a deliberately low profile.

Inside, French street lights, antique and modern furniture and a large collection of pictures cover almost every wall. The bar on the ground floor is the club's hub, with an open fire and a run of quiet corners. Above it sit the first-floor Dining Room, which seats sixty and holds eighty standing under a collection of twentieth-century lights; the Channing Williams, a Georgian room for twenty-six; the Writers' Room, industrial in finish, with a table for ten; the Library, which opens straight onto the roof terrace; and the Bellville, the smallest room in the house. The terrace seats forty and is used from spring through to autumn.

Rooms are let to members and non-members alike. The Studio is a daytime workspace and the club's main party room, with a stage, a grand piano and an in-house sound system. Taken whole, the house holds 120 seated or 300 standing across the two buildings, rising to 350 standing with the Studio. The dance floor runs off the front bar, the back bar carries its own sound and lighting, and the club holds a licence for civil ceremonies.