IT was the infamous haunt of Princess Margaret and David Bowie, the seedy Soho drinking den where a young Daniel Craig once pulled pints behind the bar. A magnet for artists, actors and a heady mix of highlife and lowlife, the Colony Room Club earned a reputation as the most notorious watering hole in London - and the most fun.
Opened in 1948, it survived decades of debauchery and scandal before closing in 2008, then reopening in 2023. Now, three years after it was gloriously brought back to life, the doors have closed once again. Few people alive know the place better than Darren Coffield, the artist behind the 2023 revival and author of Tales from the Colony Room: Soho's Lost Bohemia. He first climbed the stairs in 1988 as an art student.
Darren said. "What fascinated me was it was living history." It was a tiny, cramped, smoky room at the top of a dingy staircase - but no-one went there for the decor. The colour was in the people. You'd sit in there and you'd start chatting to a journalist who worked on the Profumo affair with Christine Keeler. Or, another afternoon, Francis Bacon might walk in, or John Hurt."
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