Travellers Club

The Travellers Club stands in a quiet corner of Pall Mall, a short walk from Trafalgar Square. Built in the 1830s to a design by Sir Charles Barry, it is a Renaissance palace of Portland stone with a tall tower added later. The building backs onto Carlton Gardens, where London plane trees line the paths. Inside, the rooms follow the grand plan Barry made for gentlemen who had travelled far. The club began in 1819 after the Napoleonic Wars, when Lord Castlereagh and others wanted a place for travellers to meet. The club’s past members read like a roll of honour of exploration and statecraft. The first committee included the Earl of Aberdeen, later Prime Minister, and Lord Auckland, who gave his name to Auckland in New Zealand. Viscount Palmerston and the Duke of Wellington were regulars, as were explorers such as Francis Beaufort and Robert FitzRoy of HMS Beagle. The library holds a cast of the Bassae Frieze from a 5th-century BCE Greek temple, brought back by architect Charles Robert Cockerell. Visitors find a series of high-ceilinged rooms arranged around a central staircase. The Coffee Room serves meals of fish and game, with puddings from an earlier age. The smoking room looks out over Carlton Gardens, while the Bramall room opens directly to the garden terrace. Bedrooms upstairs still welcome members from outside London, and the dress code remains formal at all times.