Soho clubs

Our tears have only just dried over G-A-Y’s closure, but luckily something has already come along to plug the G-A-Y-shaped hole in our hearts. Taking over the space of the former iconic LGBTQ+ venue, Matthew Jacobs Morgan’s cult club night started life in a Hackney Wick warehouse. It’s now graduated to Old Compton Street and has brought some serious names with it: already, queer icons including King Princess, Jeffrey Hinton and Princess Julia have stopped by.  The venue isn’t leaning into the occult theme for purely aesthetic reasons, though the glossy black walls and blood-red lighting may beg to differ. Named after a gathering of witches, Coven acts as an alternative assembly for the queer community. Since any witch knows how to master the art of blending in by day, the venue also lives a double-life. By day, it's a sober cafe and co-working space, aimed at rescuing queer freelancers from their kitchen tables. By night, the laptops are cleared for a multi-floor playground packed with live cabaret and techno DJs.  There's a grand piano for the cabaret sets, a decommissioned fountain filled with queer history books, and a mirror decorated in shells, handy for checking if your outfit’s still holding up by midnight. There’s also a tarot reader stationed in the loos, meaning you can have your drunken heart-to-heart with a mystic instead of a stranger by the sinks

Want to hang out with all of London’s influencers, nepo babies and celebs? Head to the Box, London’s most exclusive and scandalous venue, where cabaret shows often feature nudity, sex acts and bodily fluids. First: some context. Simon Hammerstein hit the scandalous jackpot with his New York club when it opened in 2007, combining flagrantly outrageous shows with high-rolling clientele and tales of behind-the-scenes controversy. Early in 2011, he opened the London branch. Enter, the Box Soho. So what can you expect? For a start, you won't get in unless you have very deep pockets (table reservations are several thousand pounds) and/or know someone. If you do make it in, you'll see they've remodelled the place a treat, in a decadent-chocolate-box kind of way that seems to be to the taste of the mostly young, bougie clientele. The show is of a high technical standard, with mostly exclusive acts compered by mischievous MC. Some, especially the skills-based turns, are very strong; others tend to the titillating or have more production values than originality. The stand-out is the extraordinary Rose Wood, a transgendered performer whose pieces – generally heavy on nudity, violence and bodily fluids – bespeak a sophisticated, funny and deeply humane engagement with the context of the Box and the world beyond. 

Soho’s world-famous G-A-Y Bar has everything you’d expect: cheap drink offers, a young crowd and plenty of Britney. The G-A-Y night at Heaven gets the celebrity cameos, but this popular bar is still a shrine to queer pop idols, with nightly drinks promos every time they play a video from the current diva du jour. There’s also a women’s bar in the basement, called (delightfully) Girls Go Down – popular with flirty, studenty lesbians, loathed by most older women. G-A-Y bar’s plush late-night sibling, G-A-Y Late, is round the corner at 5 Goslett Yard.

Soho’s only exclusively lesbian venue – and the longest-running by far of London’s three queer femme bars – this basement venue is run by the team behind nearby Ku Bar and has a comparable flair for laying on entertainment. With comedy, cabaret, karaoke, drag shows and quiz evenings alongside a busy programme of clubs nights, She takes its role as a stalwart of London’s lesbian scene very seriously, and stays open til 1am five nights a week.