It’s 2021, and 22-year-old Freddie* is interning at an exclusive private members’ club in the West End. A visiting European royal, who has his own vintage selection in the club’s wine cellar, has selected one of the finest bottles - worth £15,000 – to enjoy with his friends.
But to Freddie’s horror, when he retrieves the bottle he discovers it’s corked – and it’s his job to break the bad news. “He kicked off and caused an absolute scene. To the point where other members were complaining about him screaming across the restaurant,” Freddie says. “I was humiliated. And then I got a bollocking from the manager – as the interns always did – even though it obviously wasn’t my fault if the wine wasn’t kept at the right temperature.”
Whether they’re welcoming hot-headed royalty, the country’s most prominent politicians or Acne Studios-wearing, skinny cigarette-smoking creatives vying for a rooftop pool bed, private members’ clubs have become a part of modern London’s DNA right next to lime bikes, Popham’s bakery and dubious American candy shops.
Old-school clubs boast origins that date back to the 1800s, strict dress codes and membership fees that would make a nepo baby’s eyes water. An annual membership at White’s - London’s oldest gentleman’s clubs - is rumoured to cost £85,000, while at Mayfair’s Mark’s Club women are banned from wearing “light denim” and men must wear be wearing a formal blazer and smart collared shirt “at all times”.** Other, more relaxed iterations use DJ nights, spa treatments and the promise of networking with like-minded tastemakers as their selling points. At one popular chain, suits are strictly prohibited to upkeep the “creative-only” vibe of the club.
Across London’s pick ‘n’ mix of clubs, certain qualities are commonplace: rigorous application processes, years-long waiting lists and a percentage of members that succumb to the urge to tag the club’s location in every Instagram story they post. But the staff at these gatekept playgrounds also share something in common: the most premium brand of utterly ridiculous work stories.
Jack* worked as a receptionist at one of the city’s better known clubs for a year, and says that most of its famous members were “wonderful”. “It’s not every day you’re having breakfast and Emma Stone asks you where the toilet is,” he says. “That job has given me anecdotes for the rest of my life.”
There was a particular type of member that would often be ill-mannered towards staff, though. “I can picture him now. It’s the younger, artistic, usually straight guy from Kent. He’s got loads of sovereign rings on and he’s wearing a Barbour jacket. He thinks he’s really cool and will likely talk to you like shit.”
On the front desk, Jack dealt with the security team for members of the royal family sweeping the club (“Their bodyguard pushed for them to be sat at least one table away from the public, but they insisted that they didn't mind being sat next to the plebs”), and had to turn down a TV presenter from using the back entrance to avoid paparazzi (“I couldn’t let her into the back because I would literally get fired”). But one memory especially sticks in his mind – for all the wrong reasons.
One evening, he was asked to work later than usual because an A-Lister had decided to hire out the cinema, closing the entire club to all other members in the process. “Initially I was pissed off, but my opinion changed when I found out who it was,” he recalls. “Very much like in the Devil Wears Prada, where Miranda Priestly acquires the last Harry Potter novel ahead of publishing, they had acquired a children’s film before its theatrical release and hired out the cinema to watch it for their daughter’s birthday.”
The star’s manager asked Jack to book a table at a nearby Michelin-starred restaurant for afterwards, which was closed. When he told her this, she simply replied: “Just tell them who’s calling and ask them to open the kitchen. They’ll understand.” (Spoiler: they did). “All of their staff and family were lovely, but they weren’t particularly,” Jack continues. “I took them to the cinema to meet up with the rest of their family, and when I opened the door they physically pushed past me, didn’t thank me and slammed the door in my face.”
One of the most prominent figures at Freddie’s club was an internationally known British politician, who he’d serve at lunch three or four times a week. “Each time he’d come in, he’d bring a much, much younger gentleman with him,” he says. “Like, noticeably younger. Some weeks it would be three different younger guys a week. Then he’d come back in with his wife a few hours later for dinner.” Describing the politician as “provocative and slimy”, Freddie says the lunches were most definitely flirtatious. While there was hand touching, Freddie didn’t see any openly “sleazy” behaviour between the politician and his younger guests – or between any members due to the club’s “respected environment”. But these customs didn’t apply to the staff, who Freddie says were sexually harassed on a daily basis.
“A girl I worked with would regularly have her bum touched. It was normalised - even little things, like sometimes they’d touch your shoulder or the back of your leg for that bit too long. On the surface it comes across as endearing, but there’s an undertone of it being inappropriate.” Freddie claims that a number of interns before him had quit due to the inappropriate behaviour they’d experienced from members.
It wasn’t out of the ordinary for members to click their fingers to get the attention of staff, and Freddie was regularly referred to as “the boy”. Members became even ruder when they brought guests to the club, which Freddie believes was an attempt to show off. “They’d do anything to point out something you were doing wrong, like if your pronunciation of a French cheese was slightly off or if you said the strawberries were in season when they actually went out of season a few days before,” he recalls. “It’s pathetic, but you have to kind of play them at their own game and have a quick comeback because they’re on a mission to one-up you.”
On one occasion during his training, a guest screamed at Freddie because he was taking too long to fillet her lemon sole tableside (she expected it to take 45 seconds or less). “My hands were shaking and she was glaring at me, and she just turned to me and screamed, ‘Who is this boy? How am I going to eat this?’” Freddie’s manager, who was present, didn’t come to his defence. “Everyone was just glaring at me. I’ll never forget the humiliation I felt - it was kind of like you were a slave to them.”
Filleting lemon sole in a matter of seconds is one thing, but helping members to source drugs was another “normal” expectation of the job. “I would go to extreme lengths to ask the kitchen staff, ‘Guys, have you got any numbers?’” and if they did, I’d write it down on a tissue and drop it back at the table,” Freddie says. “These people have a lot of money and can get away with a lot. “Whatever they wanted, literally anything, we’d have to try our hardest to get them.”
*Names have been changed
**None of the incidents mentioned in this article took place at White’s or Mark’s Club
