In the 1950s, it was the home of The Goon Show, the BBC Home Service’s crazy-gang comedy programme that gifted the world Peter Sellers and Spike Milligan. In 1964, The Rolling Stones were taped onstage here for the BBC’s Blues in Rhythm programme. Come 1970, it was time for something completely different: the recording of the debut live album by Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
Now, a mere 125 years after it opened as the Camden Theatre, and four years since its reopening after a multi-million-pound refurbishment, Koko is embarking on a new phase of curation and creation of arts. Marking its anniversary, this week, the omni-purpose north London venue unveils two new spaces. Firstly, a recording studio in the third-floor Penthouse, part of the private members' club-within-a club that is House of Koko. Secondly, a members’ balcony allowing an eyrie-eye-view of the main, 1,500-capacity theatre’s annual slate of 150-plus live shows.
'The House of Koko is five floors, and we have three restaurants, vinyl rooms, a hidden jazz club [and more],' says Olly Bengough, Koko’s creative director and CEO/founder, as the venue also launches a short film, If These Walls Could Talk, a ghostly history of those 125 years. 'But I thought: one floor has to be about how artists and creatives use this building. And to help them facilitate whatever creative output they want, in combination with [using] all the hospitality spaces.'
Hence the studio. Located on the Penthouse floor in the area of the sprawling building devoted to the House of Koko, it’s been designed in partnership with industry-leading acousticians Munro Acoustics. The basic concept, says Bengough, is a box within a box, 'for the perfect sound insulation'. Inside that inner box is top-spec recording and performing equipment: an SSL System-T mixing desk, Bowers & Wilkins 801d monitor speakers, a Yamaha U3S piano, a Ludwig Legacy drum kit and other bits of hardware, software and kit designed to woo artists with both their capabilities and provenance. That mixing desk, for example, is the same model used to finesse the sound for Kendrick Lamar’s 2025 Super Bowl halftime show, a performance watched by 133.5 million viewers worldwide.
Recording Studio, House of Koko
'We have relationships with some of the best audio suppliers,' says Bengough by way of explaining Koko’s pursuit of the highest-end gear, adding that, somehow, 'Nasa also uses this desk to launch rockets'. That space-age gear, meanwhile, is set within retro chic design. 'I was watching Jean Luc Goddard’s [1968] Rolling Stones film Sympathy for the Devil, and I thought: let’s bring a bit of that design in. So the studio has that beautiful red/burgundy background, [giving] a 1960s/1970s rock’n’roll feel with really modern equipment.'
Also adding to the 1960s/1970s rock’n’roll feel: the ability to make a noise, if not quite 24 hours a day, then almost – artists can book the studio from 9am to 5am for that all-important late-night inspo-slash-lock-in vibe.
The studio connects directly with the Penthouse bar, which is decorated with diverse artwork by, among others, Ukrainian/American Social Realist painter Sara Berman and the photographer Jamie Morgan, co-founder of 1980s London creative collective Buffalo. That room is 'California-inspired', which means 'lots of light, a brick fireplace…' In tandem, the conjoined places allow artists to 'be in the studio, make music, then go into the Penthouse and hang out, maybe write again, do something else, go back in the studio. Basically, it’s one whole floor that’s very artist-friendly.
Recording studio, House of KOKO
'There’s a real harmony by having a space that also inspires them outside of the recording studio,' Bengough adds of the adjacent hang-out playground. 'They can work with room to breathe, because they’ve got two rooms, and have drinks service, food… It’s almost like you’re in a five-star hotel – and then they can also invite their entourage for fun late at night.'
For those younger artists not quite at the 'entourage' stage of their career, the studio is available for hire in line with Koko’s championing of up-and-coming talent across its spaces.
'If you look at our history, from [early] gigs by Amy Winehouse, Ed Sheeran, Raye, Dua Lipa, we’re always helping new talent come through. Three years ago, Olivia Dean did a three-night residency for members in Ellen’s,' Bengough says, referring to the 'secret', 50-capacity speakeasy, named after 19th/20th-century superstar actress Ellen Terry, who opened the venue in 1901. 'Six months later she played the theatre and we filmed it,' he continues of a performance that also resulted in Dean’s 2023 audio release Live from Koko. 'We’ve extended that [ethos] into the studio and will allow new artists to use it at a basic, preferential rate.'
Ellen's bar, House of Koko
The private, 50/60-capacity members’ balcony, meanwhile, is designed to cater to the kind of tastemaking audience who young artists, for better or worse, need to perform before.
'It was important to create a space within the theatre for the members – we wanted them to feel like they had a piece of it, something unique,' explains Bengough. That means a skyscraping corner of Camden that is forever the Côte d’Azur: in designing the balcony, Koko has partnered with Château Miraval, the castle and vineyard in the south of France. It has its own rock’n’roll history, both historic and more recent. Studio Miraval, which opened there in 1977, hosted recording sessions for Pink Floyd, Wham! and AC/DC. Then, in 2011, the estate was purchased by Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. After their subsequent split, Pitt reopened the studio in 2022, with its first clients including Sade, Travis Scott and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds.
Impeccable, music- and luxury-steeped credentials, then, inspired the Miraval Members’ Balcony. 'We designed the Miraval bar in the shape of their studio in France, which is actually very modern, but with wood, to keep it in harmony with the materiality of our theatre.' And, yes, it will be pouring Miraval wines.
Miraval balcony
All of which speaks to Bengough and his team’s ambition to make Koko a one-stop shop with connectivity and creativity built into the bricks. For curation and consumption, of every kind. Or, as he puts it, 'it’s about creating this bigger ecosystem and opportunity for artistry to happen'.
As if to test all this, next month, Koko will be hosting a proof-of-concept event. Last summer, American pianist and composer Jon Batiste performed a wee-hours jam in Ellen’s till 3am. After the multiple Grammy winner toured the entire complex, he declared that he wanted more. He asked and Bengough flexed, offering up all of Koko’s capabilities: Batiste is in situ for a 'one-week residency at the end of June. He’s taking over the whole building – playing in the theatre and backstage, recording in the studio, and we’re filming the sessions and making limited-edition vinyls. This building is allowing all of these things to happen because it’s fundamentally artist-friendly.'
Up in the balcony, the House of Koko jewellery-rattlers will have the best seat in the house. As Bengough puts it: 'It feels like a very inclusive space, even though it’s exclusive.'