Amy Lamé: ‘This is such sad news. My heart goes out to Rosie and all the staff’

OUTPOURINGS of sorrow and disbelief have met the news of the closure of the House of St Barnabas, a beloved non-profit members’ club tackling homelessness.

The club, based in Greek Street near Soho Square, blamed the lingering impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the partial collapse of the bar ceiling over summer for the closure.

For 150 years the House of St Barnabas has been run as a charity supporting homeless people. In 2013 the building was revamped and opened as a members’ club to support its charitable work.

Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker, as well as the actors Peter Capaldi and Brian Cox, were among the club’s founding members.

House of St Barnabas offered training, work experience, housing support and mentorship to those who experienced homelessness. Those on the training scheme were given the chance to work in jobs across the house, as receptionists, kitchen porters, chefs and in event management.

All profits made by the business were ploughed back into its charitable work. Over 10 years, the house supported 307 homeless people into “good work”.

It is closing “with immediate effect”, according to a statement released on its website this week. Graduates of the training programme will now be referred to Only A Pavement Away, an organisation that will continue to provide them with support.

According to the club, the building and chapel at 1 Greek Street “will continue to be held in trust for charitable purposes”.

The club said: “The challenges that we have faced through the pandemic and subsequent years have eroded our financial reserves.”

Despite trying “relentlessly to find ways to make the model work,” the club said, the “returns did not come quickly enough”.

“With our costs growing substantially faster than income, our business model is simply not sustainable in the current economic environment, and we have had too many ‘rainy days’ to ride it out.”

The charity is now being wound down. At the end of January, Evelyn Partners LLP will be appointed as liquidators.

In the charity’s most recent impact report, published in late 2023, chief executive Rosie Ferguson said: “Private members’ clubs have existed for centuries. They have often acted as exclusive spaces for an elite, an environment created in order to give wealthy people a space to progress their own networks and careers.”

Ms Ferguson described the decision to open the House of St Barnabas as a members’ club 10 years ago as an “audacious idea” that would help to “break the cycle of homelessness”. Since opening, the club had “welcomed thousands of members”, Ms Ferguson said.

The Feminist Book Society, which had used the club as a “home” for the past two years, said it was “devastated” to hear of the closure. “We are gutted that this iconic venue can no longer support its employment academy, or the great work which set it apart.”

London mayor Sadiq Khan’s “night czar” Amy Lamé lamented the closure: “This is such sad news. My heart goes out to Rosie and all the staff.”

The club employed 47 people, seven of whom have now been appointed to “manage the wind down” until the end of the month.