Bunnies pose on the roof of the London Playboy Club. Courtesy Playboy. Pamela Anderson, October 1989. Anderson was on a record-breaking 13 Playboy covers—this one was her first. With a cool and relaxed atmosphere and service by the iconic Playboy Bunnies, the Tale Bar is the perfect place to spend time, enjoy a late night cocktail, or treat yourself to the classic Afternoon Tea with a twist. The Playboy Club London is located on 14 Old Park Lane, Mayfair. This is 'The Opening of the London Playboy Club 1966' by John Wing on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them. When the London Playboy club opened, Hugh Hefner personally chose the women who would become Bunnies and flew them to the US for their intensive six-week training. Even American women from diverse backgrounds were required to go through the cultural practice, with one former black bunny saying, “I was a young Black girl coming from South. Playboy Club London is the pinnacle of fine dining & entertainment in Mayfair. Open to members 24/7. Home to our world-famous Bunny girls, the Playboy Club is an uninhibited, flamboyant place, where you can relax, gamble, indulge and unwind.

Playboy Club London Membership Cost

A photo taken at the opening of the very first Playboy Club in Chicago in 1960.
The first Playboy magazine hit the shelves in 1953 and in 1960, the late Hugh Hefner opened what would be the very first Playboy Club in Chicago. Other clubs would quickly emerge in more than twenty locations including Boston, Wisconsin, and Los Angeles, as well as more elaborate Playboy Club Resorts which you could visit in Jamaica and Manila. Entrance into the various clubs would run a member $25 a year for which they would receive a special key that when presented to a designated “Door Bunny” would get them inside. The clubs were designed to emulate the “Playboy lifestyle” projected by Hefner, though that’s not what initially ignited the vast existence of Playboy Clubs. The actual inspiration for the clubs began with an article in Playboy published in 1959 that detailed the goings-on at the historic Gaslight Club in Chicago’s River North area. The club was the brainchild of Burton Browne who modeled the club around the “Gay 90s” (aka the “Naughty Nineties” or the decade beginning in 1890) a debaucherous period where creativity and libidos ran wild.

Like Hefner’s future Playboy Clubs, entrance to the Gaslight required a key. Naturally, Hef was already a member of the Gaslight Club as it featured his favorite thing—half-naked women with large breasts everywhere you looked. According to Victor Lownes III, the executive of HMH Publishing Company (which would later become Playboy Enterprises in 1955) he recalled that the article received over 3,000 letters from readers of Playboy inquiring as to how they too could join this exclusive club. This set the wheels in motion for Hefner who knew how to recognize an opportunity, though at the time his vision for his Playboy-themed clubs didn’t include expansion beyond Chicago. When the doors to the fledgling club opened, it employed approximately 30 girls between the ages of 18-23 who were said to be “single, beautiful, charming, and refined.” It also somehow qualifies the old saying that people really did read Playboy articles. At least they read one in 1957. And that’s a fact.

As you may have already assumed, and much like Hefner’s storied, celebrity-studded events at the Playboy Mansion, Playboy Clubs were frequented by Hollywood’s elite, such as Frank Sinatra. The Playboy Resorts featured entertainment from acts like Sonny & Cher, Melba Moore, and Sinatra’s pal and Playboy Club regular, Sammy Davis Jr. The first Detroit club which was located right across from a church attracted prominent members of that city’s vibrant jazz scene. Even Detroit’s mayor at the time Coleman Young (who held the position for twenty years starting in 1974), was an honorary member of the Playboy Club.

Playboy Club London Wikipedia

The St. Louis location regularly hosted comedy acts like George Carlin, Flip Wilson, Joan Rivers and Steve Martin. One of the more creative locations was opened on Lake Geneva in Wisconson that featured a ski slope, chairlift and according to former Bunny Pam Ellis, a DJ booth known as the “Bunny Hutch” where Bunnies would spin records while a bubble machine and disco ball set the mood. Most if not all of the girls at Lake Geneva lived in the “Bunny Dorm” which Ellis says was surrounded by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. If a girl didn’t live in the dorms, a car would be sent for them to their home to bring them to work where they could also eat for free. Ellis looks back on her time at Lake Geneva’s Playboy Club with fondness—especially the fact that she met her husband while she was DJ’ing in the Bunny Hutch.
Frank Sinatra hanging out at the Playboy Club in Las Vegas back in the day.
I had been working on this post for a while and had just started to get some words committed to “paper” when Hefner passed away on September 27th at the age of 91. Given that somewhat unexpected event, I held off on finishing it until today as I wasn’t crazy about having DM readers think that capitalizing on the death of someone as well-known and controversial as Hugh Hefner is something we aspire to. However, I do, like so many people, look back with fondness to a time where girls in bunny tails and ears were as glamorous as the movie stars that cavorted around the same clubs with them. Below I’ve posted a huge collection of photos taken inside and on the grounds of various Playboy Clubs including some rarely seen images from the Lake Geneva location that were kindly provided to me by Adam Levin with the help of Christina Ward of Feral House.
Bunnies on top of a locally made tractor at the Lake Geneva Playboy Club in Wisconsin. Photo courtesy of Adam Levin.
Bunnies having fun at Dunn River Falls in Ochos Rios, Jamaica in 1972.
New York 1960s.
Atlanta.
New Orleans.
Detroit, 1963.
Cheryl, a Bunny at the Chicago Playboy Club, 1972.
John Lennon leaving the London Playboy Club.
Twin Bunnies Jennifer and Janis Jackson at the Chicago Playboy Club, 1965.
Cincinatti.
Bunnies at the Lake Geneva location. Image courtesy Adam Levin.
The blonde duo and real identical twin brothers Jerry and Jay Hopkins aka, Twinn Connection at the New York Playboy Club.
A shot inside the Playboy Club in Lake Geneva. Photo courtesy of Adam Levin.
SAMMY!
New Jersey.
Bunnies outside the London Playboy Club in 1969.
Chicago 1973.
A couple of Bunnies looking out over the Lake Geneva location.
Former Detroit mayor Coleman Young flanked by two Playboy Bunnies back in the mid-70s.
A poolside shot of the Playboy Resort in Jamacia, 1972.
Lake Geneva. Photo courtesy of Adam Levin.
London 1964.
Chicago 1964.
A photo of Rick James at the Los Angeles Playboy Club in 1974. Photo by James Fortune.
An ad for the coveted Playboy Club key and membership featuring Sammy Davis Jr.

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
The Grateful Dead on Hugh Hefner’s ‘Playboy After Dark,’ 1969
Playboy Playmates recreate their iconic covers 30 years on
Salvador Dali’s bizarre but sexy photoshoot for Playboy, 1973
Woody Allen gets into a pillow fight with a six-foot brunette in the pages of Playboy, 1969
Climb aboard ‘Hare-Force One,’ Hugh Hefner’s $5 million DC-9 jet with its own discothèque
‘The penis is evil!’: Sean Connery & Charlotte Rampling in ‘Zardoz,’ the Playboy spread (NSFW)

How Much Is A Playboy Club Membership

High Tea Society recently took afternoon tea at the rather unusual venue of The Playboy Club in London.

Located in upmarket Mayfair, the afternoon tea is held at the iconic Salvatore’s bar, so named for Salvatore Calabrese –self styled maestro bartender and mixologist to the rich, famous and royal.

In keeping with an establishment that takes its name from its cocktail master, the tea begins with Te’Freddo Teapot cocktails, served in heavy traditional stoneware teapots – you can choose between the traditional, Fruity, Floral or Spicy. I opt for the Fruity version of Lychee jasmine tea with lychee & peach liquers, which is just fruity enough to be refreshing with a little kick of a liquor chaser at the end.

The iconic Playboy bunnies are on hand to serve you up a selection of savouries to complement the teas, these include Caprese baguettes, Mediterranean chicken in olive rolls and smoked salmon on warm fresh bread. The Mediterranean inspired flavours of the savoury selection is a refreshing change from the usual sandwiches and evoke a sense of home cooking, albeit in an upmarket London bar. The Mediterranean chicken was a favourite, warm and smokey in flavour, the richness of the sundried tomato complementing the olive rolls perfectly.

But the desserts were calling our name and we moved onto a mouth-watering selection of Yuzu Mochi, complete with a soft Yuzu flavoured ice cream centre, Berry macarons, Carrot cake, Verrine and in keeping with the Playboy theme, Bunny Ear Cupcakes – Chocolate and Guinness cake with chocolate cream. I particularly enjoyed the rich cupcake, washed down so easily with the Teapot cocktail that seemed to have hidden depths.

In keeping with the area, Salvatore’s bar is sophisticated and classy, glass tabletops and durable white china, dimly lit with lamps and screens all wrapped with the Bunny silhouette and you can relax to the sounds of live piano playing Queen classics softly in the background. The bar is a glittering focal point, laid out with spirits and liquors of all different hues and flavours. For those in the know, the Cognac wall of Liquid History features Cognacs through the ages – there’s even one dating Pre-Titanic!

I’m not sure what I was expecting before coming to afternoon tea at the Playboy Club, but I came out pleasantly surprised. The food is very tasty with an original twist befitting an unusual venue that comes complete with Playboy bunnies and of a high standard. The cocktails manage to be both refreshing and pack a punch, a challenging combination that they do so well, perhaps not surprisingly given the resident bartender.

Dressed as the girls are in their bunny costumes, it’s interesting that the place attracts a variety of people – groups of businessmen with bottles of vintage champagne, groups of women and couples alike catching up over cocktails and afternoon tea. The service is charming and sweet and the Bunnies are on hand for service with a smile.

Salvatore’s Afternoon at the Playboy Club Menu

Playboy Club London England

• Teapot cocktails:
• Traditional – English Breakfast Tea, rum and cognac infused with sultanas, fresh milk and honey.
• Fruity – Lychee jasmine tea, pisco, lychee and peach liquers, white peach puree and orange juice.
• Floral – Jasmine blossom tea, Hendricks Gin, agave infused with lavender flowers, Maraschino, orange blossom water and fresh lemon juice
• Spicy – Sencha green tea, vodka, lemongrass, cardamon, eucalyptus, Cocchi Americano aperitif and lime flavoured sugar.
• Savouries:
• Caprese – Burrata Buffalo mozzarella, fresh basil pesto and cherry tomato served in a warm mini French baguette.
• Mediterranean chicken – Roasted corn fed chicken, mixed olives, sun blushed tomato served in a mini mixed olive roll.
• London Smoked Salmon – Curls of smoked salmon, chive and onion cream cheese served on a round olive oil toasted crouton
• Sweets
• Yuzu Mochi – A delightful chewy outer wrapper surrounding a soft Yuzu ice cream centre.
• Macaron – Seasonal berry butter cream sandwiched between two almond cookies.
• Bunny Carrot cake – Moist carrot and walnut cake topped with cream cheese icing.
• Verrine – Layers of seasonal rhubarb, yoghurt mousse topped with pecan granola.
• Bunny Ear cupcake – Chocolate and Guinness cake topped with chocolate butter cream and milk chocolate bunny ears.

How Much Did It Cost To Join The Playboy Club

Salvatore’s Bar at Playboy Club
Address: 14 Old Park Lane, Mayfair, W1K 1ND, London, UK
To book high tea at The Playboy Club London please check website link here