There’s a new cultural phenomenon unfolding in London, and it’s all about celebrating women. From Miu Miu’s pop-up ladies-only private members club at the Café Royal in Regent Street last December, to KC’z, Soho’s women-only venue in Frith Street which opened on February 1st – the trend is to offer like-minded women their own space free of male company, because contrary to popular belief, we do actually like not seeing you blokes occasionally.
Men have been excluding women since the 18th century anyway, with Gentleman’s clubs such as Boodles, Turf and The Garrick providing a private haven away from London’s busy bars and restaurants. But unlike these men-only members’ clubs where it’s all about panelled rooms, dusty pictures of someone’s ancestors on the walls, cigars and remembering which way to pass the port – women are doing it with a lot more style (naturally).
Just a stone’s throw from the hustle and bustle of Knightsbridge is a new women-only members club with a difference – describing itself as an “exclusive private club for spirited, sophisticated, health-conscious women who want the very best” – the Grace Belgravia is not only a place to socialise and network with other women, but it’s predominantly a holistic health spa, restaurant and nutrition service. The emphasis at the club is on acting as a support for women of all ages, providing medical, career, beauty and fitness advice, with a variety of experts and practitioners on hand specialising in advanced diagnostics, fertility, exercise physiology, stress and sleep science.
The club also boasts a library and salon / bar where numerous evening events, lectures and book signings take place, as well as guest speakers who have recently included Sam Branson – the son of Virgin boss Richard, Sam presented a private screening of his documentary “Breaking The Taboo”, which explores the US led War On Drugs. Author and writer Naomi Wolf is also on the list of upcoming speakers, as pioneering feminist and ground-breaking editor Rosie Boycott is set to interview her exclusively in the club.
The brainchild of Kate Percival and Chris O’Donoghue, Grace Belgravia is set in a stylish and minimalist grade-two listed building, providing state-of-the-art wellness resources including a high tech gym run by Samantha Cameron’s very own personal trainer Matt Roberts, and a medical clinic headed up by the Queen’s GP, Dr Tim Evans. Basically you can get everything from a colonic to a consultation with a plastic surgery expert, all under one vaulted ceilinged roof.
The emphasis is very much on the club instilling itself into people’s lives and routines, although that doesn’t come cheap at £5,500 for a year’s membership (plus £2,000 joining fee), but once you step inside the club, you’re assigned your own personal ‘Angel’ to guide you and support you through the various medical treatments, anti-ageing therapies, gym programmes and nutrition plans. It’s bespoke boosting for the mind and body, and that’s when you know every membership penny is worth it, and as Kate Percival says, “The fees are no more than having one and a half personal trainer’s a week, and do you know how many people have personal trainers these days?!”. However, if you prefer, there is a more affordable option of a weekend membership at £2,800, which allows women to use the club from 4pm on a Friday until 8pm on a Sunday, with up to 10 visits to the restaurant or admission to events at other times.
Since its launch in November last year, the club already has 110 members ranging from their 20s through to their 60s, with an average age of 43-years-old. The diverse mix, which includes Brits and Americans predominantly, is made up of out-of-towners as well as those from the SW1 postcode. The philosophy behind the club is to ’empower and nurture women through seven ages of life from young adulthood, through fertility, pregnancy, child rearing, empty nesting, menopause and ageing-well’.
“The theory is to support women. I wanted to create a place where they could come and feel nurtured, cared for and intellectually stimulated” said Kate.
It’s also important to point out that places like Grace Belgravia show how there has been a shift in the way women engage with one another in modern society – we have become less competitive, and more embracing of the sorority of sisterhood.
The nurturing element also extends to the specially created menu by former Beach Blanket Babylon chef Sophie Wright, who has introduced a dynamic and nutritious selection of meals from breakfast and lunch through to afternoon tea and dinner. For my lunch, I tried (and fell in love with) the ceviche dressed in a citrus cure, accompanied by a Quinoa salad with baked aubergine, feta, pine nuts and pomegranate seeds all dressed in a natural yoghurt and sumac dressing. I also tried the edamame, petit pois, beetroot, goats cheese and roasted hazlenut salad, with a little taster of Pumpernickel bread – my taste buds were truly awakened!
Other menu delights include broths, soups and warm bowl food, as well as a selection of juices and smoothies including my choice, ‘Cleanse Me’ – a combination of carrot, apple, beetroot, ginger and lemon – good for blood pressure, cleansing and alkalising or ‘balancing the pH of your body’. If you fancy something a little more on the stronger side to accompany your lunch, there is the bio-dynamic wine – basically wines made with a minimum amount of fuss and intervention. As Fiona Beckett writing for The Guardian in 2011 referred to them, “They are, if you like, the wine world’s equivalent of sourdough bread and unpasteurised cheese.” To me that just means healthy wine, so we can have more of it (but don’t take my word for it).
Moving on to the spa element of the club, and members have access to the UK’s first Acqua Calda spa, nine treatment rooms and a hammam. The spa offers a number of signature treatments using well-known beauty brands such as Dr. Levy, Chenot and Dr. Hauschka. Members can also enjoy various mind, body and soul classes such as pilates and yoga. Massage therapy is also designed to take you to another level spiritually, physically and mentally, and after my one-hour ‘signature massage’ with Monica – a qualified physiotherapist who was extremely intuitive and connected with my body’s needs – I was left in a dream-like state and didn’t want to leave, as I floated out of the room.
The trouble is, when you experience this level of luxury and a massage that leaves you unable to speak, your brain turns to mush and you forget how to do the simplest things (because there’s usually someone on hand to do them for you). For example, my locker in the changing rooms was a right bugger to open, and I spent at least 5mins flapping around in my flip flops trying to remember my 4-digit code. Then like a ray of light, two staff appeared, zapped my locker (that’s what it looked like anyway) and tada! I was able to get dressed and not spend the rest of my afternoon in a towelling robe and no underwear.
In between treatments, a bite to eat, or a work-out in the gym, members are also able to partake in another form of therapy – retail therapy – as the club also boasts an atelier in which a carefully curated series of pop up shops enables members to have priority access to the latest styles on the radar. When I visited, I browsed the rails of Browns newest offerings, and if you can’t find what you want in your size or colour, the club will personally contact the store and have it delivered to you. This is the ultimate personal shopping experience – tell the store manager ‘I’ll have one of each’ and then pop off to the sauna.
Once you’ve chilled out in the spa’s rest area or sauna, you can continue in relaxation mode in the club’s library with one of its many books, all of which are carefully selected from Heyward Hill of Curzon Street, (I spotted Grace Coddington’s ‘Grace’ right away). The eclectic mix of fashion and lifestyle books notably add to the highly stylised edge of the club – you won’t find any well-thumbed Mills & Boons here.
Talking of style, the salon and bar area also features one of the most eye-catching pieces of artwork I have ever seen – a portrait of a young Elizabeth Taylor by British artist Benjamin Shine, made entirely from tulle. Shine uses this medium rather than paint and is renowned for exploring the boundaries of creativity to produce unique artworks, installations and sculptures. The salon also includes an impressive mix of coffee-table look good books, all of which are titles published by Taschen – it’s a great space to enjoy flicking through art and photography tomes while you sip a champagne (sugar free of course).
As we spoke over lunch, I asked founder Kate to tell me about some of the feedback she receives from members, and immediately she recalled a lady who came in suffering from a great deal of stress and a family bereavement. She was a lawyer with two small children, under a great deal of pressure to prove herself career-wise, while coping with the demands of being a wife and mother. As Kate explained, after a period of time at the club being nurtured and cared for, she was a totally different woman, completely liberated into feeling she could cope with her life again. “Here was somebody who ostensibly could do it all and have it all, but was actually feeling like hell” said Kate. “That to me felt so good to be able to help her and give her that support to move forward. I want women to be kind and caring to one another, that’s the whole point of calling the club Grace, it’s about being gracious to one another.”
As writer, critic and philosopher William Hazlitt once wrote, “Gracefulness has been defined to be the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul”.
Like the lawyer who felt life was too much to cope with but was transformed, as I stepped out of Grace Belgravia, I felt a renewed sense of inner peace and optimism for re-structuring my own way of life – give up smoking again (tick), drink less alcohol (tick), sleep more (tick), exercise daily (tick), and eat well (a packet of Percy Pigs on the hoof between meetings does not count).
The club’s mantra is ‘inside out beauty’ and after just a few hours cocooned within its walls of calm and tranquility, along with meeting a wonderful mix of intelligent, charming and talented women, I think they should probably change their name to ‘Amazing Grace (Belgravia)’
For more information on Grace Belgravia, call +44 20 7235 8900 or visit the website
