The Candlelight Club: A Night in Havana

A regular pop-up 1920s speakeasy in a secret London venue completely lit by candles, with live jazz bands, cabaret and retro-DJs.

This time we whisk you off to Old Havana, once a Spanish colonial stronghold, now a playground for Prohibition-weary American visitors who hopped over from the mainland in droves for a legal drink or seven. Pan Am even put on boat plane flights directly into Havana harbour and teamed up with Bacardi for an ad campaign exhorting Americans to "Leave the Dry Lands Behind" and "Fly with us to Havana and you can bathe in Bacardi rum two hours from now." The US Consul grumbled, “I have seen people leaving incoming ships who have stopped at bars on their way to the hotel. By the time they reached the hotel they could scarcely ask the reception clerk for a room."

Sloppy Joe's bar (the self-styled "crossroad of the world") was rammed with celeb ex-pats and visitors, from Clark Gable and Errol Flynn to Jean-Paul Sartre and the Duke of Windsor. Ernest Hemingway became a regular after he adopted Cuba as his home. Also popular with the smart set was Bar Florida (nicknamed "Floridita"), which claimed to be the birthplace of the Daiquiri.

We'll be celebrating this cosmopolitan scene with a menu of classic Cuban cocktails, and we’ll also be offering an expanded range of genuine Havana cigars to smoke in our private palm-filled courtyard garden. Upmarket Cuban clubs and hotels had jazz bands just like their American counterparts—we too will have live jazz, from the five-piece Shirt Tail Stompers, as well as cabaret from Champagne Charlie and the vintage vinylism of our DJ Auntie Maureen.

The kitchens will be open all night, offering a three-course set menu as a preorder, plus a range of bar snacks. Guests receive an email two days before revealing the secret location.

"The closest you'll find to an authentic Jazz Age experience in central London. Its unique ambience, fuelled by hundreds of candles, is truly a scene to behold." —Time Out