Argyll Rooms (1 results)

Large colour printed poster on thin card, laid down on card, 415 x 325 mm. Rare, the only copy traced. Following the success of Laurent's Casino which opened in 1848, other night clubs sprang up in London, this being one of them. Robert Bignell took over the lease of the building and opened the Argyll rooms in 1851. The Argyll Rooms soon achieved notoriety, and in 1862 Henry Mayhew, when describing prostitution in London, mentioned that 'A drawing-room floor in Queen Street [now Denman Street]. which is a favourite part on account of its proximity to the Argyll Rooms, is worth three, and sometimes four pounds a week'. H. G. Hibbert, who patronized the place in the 1870's, compared it to 'a modern night club, without its perfunctory condition of election to membership. You just bought a ticket and went inâ"to mix with the demi-reps and the demi-mondaines who danced and drank till morning'. Bignell made a great fortune out of the place, and in 1864 he acquired the freehold of it but he was finally deprived of his licence for music and dancing and the Argyll Rooms closed on 30 November 1878.