Reporting from inside the world of private members’ clubs — the great houses of London and New York, industry news, and the stories behind the doors.
Boodle's was founded in January 1762 by William Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne, who later became Prime Minister, and takes its name from an early head waiter, Edward Boodle. The club moved to its Grade I listed clubhouse at 28 St James's Street in 1782. Historic members have included Winston Churchill, Adam Smith and the Duke of Wellington; membership is by nomination and election.
Home House occupies a Georgian townhouse at 20 Portman Square, Marylebone, largely designed by Robert Adam after he replaced James Wyatt in 1777 and regarded as his finest surviving London townhouse. The building has operated as a private members' club since 1998.
The Arts Club was founded in 1863 by figures including Charles Dickens, Anthony Trollope and Lord Leighton as a meeting place for those in the creative arts. It has occupied 40 Dover Street in Mayfair since 1894. Nineteenth-century members and guests included Millais, Whistler, Kipling, Monet, Rodin and Degas.
The Groucho Club opened on 5 May 1985 at 45 Dean Street in Soho, with its name referencing Groucho Marx's line about not wanting to belong to any club that would have him as a member. Its members are drawn mainly from the publishing, media, entertainment and arts industries.
Founded in 1836 by Whig MP Edward Ellice, the Reform Club on Pall Mall grew out of the reforming politics of the era. Its palatial clubhouse was designed by Sir Charles Barry, based on the Palazzo Farnese in Rome. It was one of the first of London's original gentlemen's clubs to change its rules to admit women on equal terms, doing so in 1981.
Founded in 1819, the Travellers Club at 106 Pall Mall is the oldest of the surviving Pall Mall clubs, conceived after the Napoleonic Wars as a place for well-travelled gentlemen to host distinguished foreign visitors. Its original rules required members to have travelled at least 500 miles from London in a direct line. The clubhouse was designed by Sir Charles Barry and completed in 1832.
White's began in 1693 as a chocolate house and is described as London's oldest club, moving to its present premises at 37–38 St James's Street in 1778. The clubhouse is a Grade I listed building, and the club maintains an exclusively male membership. Notable members have included King Charles III and William, Prince of Wales.
In May 2024 members of the Garrick Club, founded in 1831, voted to admit women for the first time, ending nearly two centuries of male-only membership. The decision passed by roughly a 60:40 margin following a closed-door debate at the London club.
Annabel's opened on 4 June 1963 in a basement beneath 44 Berkeley Square, founded by Mark Birley and named after his wife, Lady Annabel. The space was identified by Birley's friend John Aspinall, and early membership cost five guineas a year, drawing aristocrats and society figures. Birley sold the club to Richard Caring in 2007, ending more than four decades of family ownership.
Casa Cipriani, a hotel and private members' club, opened in August 2021 inside Lower Manhattan's Beaux-Arts Battery Maritime Building, a former ferry terminal. The interiors were restored and designed by Thierry Despont, working with Marvel Architects on the conversion. Members pay annual dues reported in the thousands of dollars, and gain early booking access to the hotel's rooms.
The CORE Club, a private members' club founded in New York in 2005 by Jennie Enterprise, relocated in September 2023 from 66 East 55th Street to 711 Fifth Avenue. The new flagship spans roughly 60,000 square feet across the building's top four floors, including more than 6,000 square feet of outdoor space.
Restaurateur Nick Jones opened the first Soho House above his Café Bohème restaurant in London in 1995. In 2003 he opened Soho House New York, the group's first location outside the UK, with 24 bedrooms, a cinema, bar, restaurant, Cowshed spa and private members' club.
The Aman Club occupies part of Aman New York, which opened in August 2022 in the landmarked Crown Building at Fifth Avenue and 57th Street. Membership is capped at 600, with a reported first-year fee of $200,000 and $15,000 annual renewal. The building, completed in the early 1920s by Warren and Wetmore, was the first home of the Museum of Modern Art in 1929.
Established in 1872 by San Francisco journalists and artists, the Bohemian Club keeps a city clubhouse at 624 Taylor Street on Nob Hill and owns Bohemian Grove, a redwood retreat in Sonoma County. The Grove hosts an annual two-week summer encampment and its 'Cremation of Care' ceremony, first devised in 1881 by co-founder James F. Bowman. The club remains men-only.
The Metropolitan Club was founded in March 1891 by a group of wealthy New Yorkers led by financier John Pierpont Morgan. Its Italian Renaissance Revival clubhouse at Fifth Avenue and 60th Street was designed by McKim, Mead & White, with Stanford White as principal designer. Construction of the clubhouse cost roughly one million dollars, excluding furnishings.
Founded on 6 May 1860, the Olympic Club is the oldest athletic club in the United States. Its original Post Street clubhouse, opened in 1893, was destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, and a new clubhouse was completed in 1912. The club operates three golf courses, including the championship Lake Course, in the southwestern corner of the city.
Founded in 1836, the Union Club is the oldest private club in New York City and the second-oldest city club in the United States, after the Philadelphia Club. It is nicknamed the 'Mother of Clubs' because many other private clubs grew out of its membership. Its current clubhouse at 101 East 69th Street, designed by Delano & Aldrich, opened on 28 August 1933.
Zero Bond, founded by restaurateur Scott Sartiano, opened in October 2020 at 0 Bond Street in Manhattan's NoHo neighborhood. The roughly 20,000-square-foot interior, designed by Bill Sofield, occupies an 1874 Victorian Gothic building that once housed a Brooks Brothers factory, retaining its arched windows, open-beam ceilings and exposed red brick. Membership to the club is by application.
Tech entrepreneurs Michael and Xochi Birch prepared to open The Battery, a private members' club at 717 Battery Street in San Francisco, in the summer of 2013. The four-story, 50,000-square-foot club was set to feature four bars, fine dining, a wine cellar, hotel suites and a fitness area. The Birches bought the historic Musto Building in 2009 and spent tens of millions on its renovation.
Elite Traveler charts the migration of private members' clubs from cities to rural estates, noting more clubs have opened in the past five years than in the three decades after 1985. The article points to a shift away from traditional excess toward wellness-led offerings such as personalised nutrition and health diagnostics, citing new rural entrants including Nobu Woolfox in Rutland and Long Lane in Sussex, billed as the UK's first sober members' club opening in summer 2026.
The Hollywood Reporter examines whether New York's private members' club scene has reached saturation, noting the market effectively targets a small pool of affluent New Yorkers, many of whom already hold several memberships at once. It traces a wave of openings from Soho House (2003) and Zero Bond (2020) through Aman Club, Casa Cruz, Colette and 2025 arrivals such as Crane Club and Moss, with more clubs still in the pipeline.
Euronews reports on the growing trend of luxury hotels launching their own private members' clubs to turn properties into community destinations rather than places guests only pass through. It highlights hotel-linked club concepts including The Cover by Sircle Collection, which expanded to Vienna in November 2025 with London and Amsterdam planned, and Club Woodward by Auberge, which opened in Geneva in March 2026 with a London outpost to follow.
Luxury Tribune reports on a new wave of ultra-luxury private clubs opening across Paris, led by Work Palace, set to launch in summer 2026 on Boulevard Saint-Germain with a restaurant, guest rooms and members-only spaces. The project has drawn high-profile backers and principals including Xavier Niel and Rasmus Michau, and was unveiled at an invitation-only event at the Hotel George V.
Time Out reports that Club Hue, a new private members' club from hospitality entrepreneur Robert Kim, will open in Los Angeles's Koreatown in June 2026, drawing on the Korean concept of hueshik ('rest'). The club offers capped, tiered membership starting at $7,500 with benefits including reciprocal access to other private clubs, hotel partnerships and concierge services.
Salon reports on the surge in high-priced members' clubs, citing figures such as Aman New York's roughly $200,000 initiation fee plus $15,000 annual dues and Zero Bond's reported waitlist of about 10,000 people while it admits only a few hundred new members a year. The piece frames scarcity as central to these clubs' appeal, quoting an academic who argues exclusivity only works when membership feels genuinely rare.
ICONIC Episode reports on No Homme, a new private members' club set to open on the 17th floor of the Waldorf Astoria in Dubai's DIFC, founded by Piero Giglio, Carmelo Cannata and Massimo Shayegan. The club blends business networking with wellness and leisure, featuring spas, grooming and fitness, business lounges, private dining, an outdoor pool and cocktail bars.
City A.M. examines the future of women-only members' clubs after AllBright entered administration for a second time and downsized dramatically, closing its Maddox Street clubhouse and moving to a smaller co-hosted lounge. The piece places AllBright's troubles alongside earlier closures of The Wing, Chief's London outpost, Grace Belgravia and Marguerite, and weighs whether female-only venues or mixed clubs centring women's advancement are the better model.
Country & Town House rounds up five new London members' clubs opening in 2025, spanning a range of price points and neighbourhoods. Featured openings include Lighthouse Social in Fulham (from £1,200 a year), NEXUS Club London in South Kensington (£9,000 a year, held fixed for five years), The Arding Rooms in Clapham, The Club at The Other House, and Shikhar in Knightsbridge.
The Pembroke, a new members' club at 6-7 Grosvenor Place in Belgravia, will span over 50,000 sq ft across a historic townhouse once home to prime minister Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman — the largest members' club in London's history when it opens in autumn 2026. Facilities include a Japanese chef's table, a caviar and champagne room, a nightclub open until 3am and a whisky bar. Membership runs from £1,500/year for under-30s to £2,750/year standard.
The Sloane Club in Chelsea opened Café 1922, a public-facing café on the exterior of the members-only club at 52 Lower Sloane Street — the first time in the club's 104-year history it has welcomed non-members. The café serves pastries by head baker Luke Walsh-Landles, including a signature 'Sloane Pain au Suisse', and becomes a low-intervention wine bar in the evenings.
Six Senses opened its first London property on 1 March 2026 at The Whiteley in Bayswater, incorporating Six Senses Place — the brand's inaugural private members' concept focused on community and high-tech wellness. The property has 109 rooms, 14 branded residences and a 2,300 sq m spa featuring London's first hotel magnesium pool, cryotherapy and a longevity clinic.
A round-up of Mayfair members' clubs notes that more clubs have opened in the past four years than in the three decades after the Groucho Club launched in 1985. It highlights 2026 arrivals including Selfridges' 40 Duke, Maslow's Kensington and Triplebond inside the BoTree Hotel, while noting traditional clubs like the Hurlingham retain decades-long waiting lists.
Soho House announced its 2026 pipeline, headlined by Soho House Tokyo — the brand's 50th house and first in Japan — opening in spring 2026 in Minami-Aoyama with four floors of club space, a rooftop pool and 42 bedrooms. Other 2026 plans include Soho House Flatiron in New York, Soho House Los Cabos in Mexico, and new houses in Milan, Madrid and Lisbon.
Maslow's, the group behind 1 Warwick in Soho and Mortimer House in Fitzrovia, will open its third London house at The Kensington Building in spring 2026. The two-floor venue combines shared workspaces, private offices for up to 40 people, lounges, a members-only café, a gym and studio, with a focus on wellbeing and sustainability.
An analysis by RLA Global reports the global private members' club market is forecast to reach $59.1 billion by 2033, growing about 7.2% annually from $31.7 billion in 2024. It notes newer members skew under 45 and heavily from technology, finance and creative sectors, and that business services now generate an estimated 30–40% of club revenues.
Soho House agreed to be taken private by an investor group led by hotel company MCR in a deal valuing the members' club at roughly $2.7 billion including debt, at $9 per share in cash. Actor and investor Ashton Kutcher will join the board on completion, and MCR CEO Tyler Morse becomes vice chairman; the deal removes Soho House from the NYSE. At the time the company reported over 270,000 members across 46 locations.
The Ned is planning a countryside members' club and hotel estate within 100 miles of London, scheduled to open in 2028 or 2029 — its first ground-up development rather than a repurposing of an existing landmark. Group managing director Gareth Banner described it as a newly created concept aimed at millennial and Gen Z audiences.
Selfridges is launching 40 Duke, a private members' club on the fourth floor of its flagship store, accessible from street level or through the department store itself. The venue features a private dining room, a bar and lounge seating 80 indoors and a terrace for 64 under a retractable canopy, open until as late as 1:30am at weekends.
The Groucho Club is opening its first location outside London — Groucho Bretton — inside the historic Bretton Hall, set within the 500-acre Yorkshire Sculpture Park in Wakefield, scheduled for 2026. The venue will feature 40 bedrooms available to non-members, who can access members' benefits during their stay.