Ministry of Sound has grown up as London has grown up. The stalwart of the city’s nightlife scene is opening a new club this July – but it’s not what you might expect. The Ministry (a stone’s throw away from the original London Bridge venue which opened 25 years ago) will be a chic, shared working space-cum- private members club.
Like the nightclub, door policy will be strict. The Ministry will be open to a tight cache of industry professionals and companies: music businesses, film and TV producers, marketing agencies, PR firms, technology start-ups, and fashion designers.
Creative people like this spent their youth dancing at the Ministry of Sound, and will continue to dance (if only round the boardroom table) at The Ministry, thinks chairman Lohan Presencer. ‘The people we grew up with are now the founders and CEOs of start-ups and established businesses. The Ministry is for these people – independent creatives who light the sparks that become cultural wildfires.’
Designed by south London native, Squire and Partners (which operates out of nearby Brixton), The Ministry will feature an impressive (if gratuitous) 21m-bar spanning the entire ground floor. Other facilities include a full table service restaurant, immersive technology studio, 36-seater cinema, soundproof production suites and serviced meeting rooms where you can order lunch at the push of a button.
Nightclubs and pubs are shutting down in the capital as fast as co-working spaces are popping up. It’s a sign of the times that our contemporary clubs feature more meeting rooms than powder rooms.
But The Ministry does not intend to compete with London’s nightlife scene, instead, it hopes to bring a drop of the glamorous midnight oil into our working days. If we stay for a few drinks after punching out, all the better.
‘For young people working in the creative industries in London you spend more time at work than you do at home,’ Presencer explains. ‘Where you work should be fun, inspiring, packed with fantastic facilities and full of people like you. This is a place where creative businesses will thrive and grow, where our membership will look forward to coming to work. You’ll never want to leave!’
