1 room (10 Room)

Member Name: jacquelina

Product:	10 Room
Date:	07/06/01 (153 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Friendly staff, Stylish, Luxurious

Disadvantages: Drinks prices, Door policy, Music

The 10 Room is one of those cool So-Ho bars that can be difficult to get into but when you are in you wonder why. It's lacking in atmosphere, overpriced, but pretty stylish. And it has some NICE lavatories.

I went to 10 Room on a recent Friday night, after meeting some friends beforehand in the Warwick (on Warwick Street), which has become our regular meeting place on an evening due to it's central location, friendly staff, decent prices...but enough about that.

A friend-of-a-friend (always useful people) had put 3 of us on the guest-list for 10-room. Now what is it about people in London who do the guest-lists, they just don't seem to be able to read. Bit of a problem there. After 5 minutes of scanning up and down the list, oh what a surprise, there we all are. We were there all along - she must have just 'missed' us. Easily done. And so the velvet rope is disdainfully lifted aside, and we're in! Hoo-bloody-ray!

We walk up some stairs. It is dark and quiet. We walk up some more stairs. We see a set of foreboding closed doors, but still hear nothing. We carry on walking up, and don't you know, it's one of those bloody staircases that morphs into a roof. A staircase to nowhere. It's about this time that I begin to suspect that a trapdoor is going to open which we will all fall through into a slippery chute which deposits us outside into a gutter by the bouncers' feet, whilst inside the bar all the cool people watch this relayed to them on a giant video screen and piss themselves laughing at us plebs who actually thought we were going to get into 10 room. You know, like on James Bond when the guy goes in the lift and the floor opens and he is dropped into the sharks tank... never mind. Thankfully this doesn't happen, we totter back down the stairs to the foreboding closed doors, give them a gentle push, and....

That's more like it! 10 room is essentially a giant room, with a bar as yo
u walk in and a bar at the far end. In the centre there is a square composed of various sofas and tables which create cosy little corners. I was annoyed to see that all of these were reserved - it was only about 9.30pm. A sort of continous padded bench then runs all rthe way around the back of this inner square - this where we ended up uncomfortably perched - nowhere to put your glass, although at least you can rest an ashtray on them. There is also seating in the form of various seats and sofas around the outside of the room.

10 room is certainly very stylish. It's fairly low key, the lighting is low, the colours are muted dark reddish tints, I think, and it all looks expensive. The clientele are also very stylish, and there's alot of "dollar" floating around in there, as you'd expect. It was fairly cliquey, but the bar-staff were all really friendly - they'd have to be considering the price of the drinks. I hope you are all sitting down here..deep breaths.....1 vodka + lime, 1 vodka + lemonade and a strawberry daiquiri....£21. TWENTY ONE POUNDS!! Okay, you're getting the picture - this is not a girls night out bar - this is get in, buy one drink and make it last until you've seen all you want to see, and then split. They were doubles mind you, the drinks. So that's a tiny bit less painful.

I would recommend this bar as a nice place to go on a date - if your partner is paying - it's intimate, low-key and the music is quiet. In fact I had to struggle to hear it at all. Eventually they turned it up - I can't remember what the music was but it was nothing to write home about.

Call me a sucker, but the thing I liked best about this place was the bar staff. They were so attentive - there will be a handsome young chap with a cigarette lighter under your nose before you can say Malboro light. The ashtrays are emptied - unobtrusively mind you - after every 3 or 4 deposits of fag ash - and there is wa
iter service for the drinks too, again as you'd expect at those prices.

And the loos have to be seen to be believed. I don't know what the 10 room is attached to but it's very surreal - when you walk out of the bar to go to the loos its like you've walked into a 10star hotel, and the loos are the same. Luxury cream carpets, gold embossed taps, full length mirrors and every kind of toiletry under the sun. Call me old-fashioned, but I do like to go to a toilet with a door that locks, a dry floor and, yes I may be being controversial here, but toilet roll does make the whole experience more pleasant too you know.

Well, I'm struggling to think what to write about now, probably because we left after about 45 minutes - I'm sure it would have got busier and livelier later on, but I don't think the night would have been particularly spectacular. One for a quiet drink at the start or the end of the evening, but it didn't really float me boat.
And, despite the fact that we are 3 well-presented, fashionable and attractive girls (sorry to be so shallow) I don't think the door staff would have been in a hurry to let us in had we not been in the guest list. I don't know what the policy is, but give it a go, you might just be what they are looking for. Lucky you.

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