In 1977, ten overseas bankers established a members club in Hong Kong. Called simply the Club, it became an indispensable hub for industry leaders’ professional and hospitality needs. Now known as the Hong Kong Bankers Club, and managed by the Hong Kong & Shanghai Hotels Group’s Peninsula Clubs & Consultancy Services, the home-away-from-home for the region’s financial elite sports a new home by local firm In Situ & Partners.
Sprawling some 22,000 square feet within the Nexxus building, a tower in the heart of the city’s Central Business District, the club compounds historical Chinese and British influences with the retro-futurism of 1970s club chic. An entry escalator rises in a tunnel lacquered in auspicious red and gold, with brass inlays and mirrors designed to lift the spirit regardless of the day’s market performance. “We had to create the moment when you are disconnecting from normal life,” says In Situ & Partners founder Yacine Bensalem.
This blissful disconnection carries into the amenities, including a timber-screened terrace bar and an interior one of fluted, patinated copper topped with black Sahara marble and lit by famed designer Koichi Tanaka of Lightlinks. A pair of dining options are the true dividend. The Treasury offers Western cuisine in a Western-inflected blue and gray room of velvet and padded leather, with walls boasting gold-framed lithographs of local environs. The Dragon, meanwhile, looks East, with Cantonese cuisine served in a fresh take on Chinese banquets, complete with chinoiserie-upholstered chairs, walls clad in wood boiserie panels, and high-gloss lacquered doors. Both are sure to reward interest to the club’s 2,000 members.
Below, take a look around the expansive club.
