Proprietor Michael Wojas © Rob Greig
The Colony Room’s fight for survival
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By Rob Crossan
Posted: Wed Oct 8 2008 -
Time Out gets the latest on the legendary Soho members' club's fight for survival
‘They serve love in a glass – if it goes, there’ll be nowhere for us to go.’ Sebastian Horsley – writer, bohemian and sozzled Soho bon vivant – is talking about the Colony Room, the Dean Street members’ club that has kept the likes of Francis Bacon, Dylan Thomas, Damien Hirst and even Princess Margaret lubricated.
The club, founded by Muriel Belcher in 1948, looks likely to relocate at the end of the year, which has caused an outcry. Speaking to Time Out, leaseholder Michael Wojas – who has worked at the club since the early 1980s – expresses his fury at Horsley and other members of a recently formed shadow committee, which claims that Wojas has failed to answer questions about the move to relinquish the lease on the old room.
‘Sebastian Horsley isn’t even a fucking member,’ he says. ‘It’s very straightforward: the landlord wants to redevelop and we should have been out in March. He gave us an extension until Christmas so we could celebrate the club’s sixtieth birthday. Everybody on the committee knew back in March – and I have the minutes to prove it – that we had no option but to leave. Everybody on the committee agreed, so why is there an argument now?’
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Wojas put much of the original artwork decorating the club’s sweaty green walls up for auction two weeks ago in a controversial sale – many members say they donated work to the club, not to any individual – that didn’t make much money, despite including works by Damien Hirst and Sam Taylor-Wood.
Still, according to lawyer and long-standing club member Stephen ‘Black Sheep’ Lees, all this talk of the demise of what has been called the ‘last great Soho institution’ is premature. ‘We have found a new venue,’ he tells Time Out exclusively. ‘It’s on Bateman Street, but we’re also looking at other possible locations. It’s incredibly hard to say goodbye to Dean Street and we feel like we’ve let previous generations down by this happening on our watch, but the club has been on the wane. The wrong sort of people have been coming in and we all understand Michael’s desire to retire after 27 years of service. We just wish there was more transparency. He hasn’t responded to club members, hasn’t attended meetings and hasn’t provided the information we want regarding the decision to close the club and redevelop this space.’ The shadow committee wants Wojas to hold an AGM and give more details about the closure. As for the funds from the auction, ‘We did reach a compromise,’ says Horsley, who withdrew his work from the sale, insisting it belonged to the premises. ‘The profits are now in an account overseen by our lawyers and Michael’s lawyers. Michael needs to prove he owns the artworks sold before any money can be transferred to him.’
Pictures of past members
Wojas’s response is typically robust. ‘The auction business is nonsense. I even have a letter from Michael Andrews’s widow [a mural by Andrews sold for £32,000 at the auction] confirming that the painting belongs to me. I’m going to call an AGM which I hope will take place by the end of October. I’d call one earlier if, as the rules state, 60 paid-up members request one. The lists I’ve received have never made up that number as so many people either aren’t members or haven’t paid their membership fees in years. They’re right that I’ve been letting people become members who wouldn’t have got through the door ten years ago, but the club needs the money.’
Wojas also feels slighted by accusations that he has obstructed plans to reassign the lease. ‘I was supportive of Hamish McAlpine and Lisa Stansfield taking over the lease,’ he says. ‘But they withdrew. Maybe they realised that fighting the landlord would be expensive, they’d be unlikely to succeed and that, at the end of the day, they’d still only have a front room with a bar that doesn’t make any money.’
For Lees, this fuss clouds the issue. ‘It’s not about injunctions,’ he says, ‘it’s about having somewhere for us to get pissed come January 6. It’s time to pull together as a family and move on and we’re keen to hear from anybody who can help us achieve that goal.’
For Horsley the passing of the original will be a hard shot to swallow. ‘If it’s a choice between supporting a new venue and not having a Colony Room at all, then I’ll support a new venue, but only once I know there’s no alternative. We’re hoping Michael will answer our questions. At the moment, much as I love him, it’s hard to come to any conclusion other than that he’s sold us all down the river.’
Wojas, however, feels the club needs to change. ‘I’m not retiring, as many people think, and I would have done more to help find a new venue if I hadn’t been so busy fighting this shadow committee bollocks,’ he explains. ‘The members might have to take a break for a while, but I’m totally committed to some sort of future for the club. It just won’t be a shabby green room on Dean Street any more.’
To contact Stephen Lees regarding a new venue for the Colony Room, email prodev@globalnet.co.uk.- Add your comment to this feature
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2 comments
Such a pity to hear the colony rooms are shutting the doors Michael. I remember the green paint so well. Look after the little pen and ink drawing that uncle IDA hung over the bar ! Wishing you all the very best, kindest regards.
The closure of this cess pit will not be such a grave loss to Londons so called Bohemian society. The majority of the members who drink there could also be described as lecherous dirty old men/drunks and has beens.