Decadence, dress codes, home at 11pm - inside Tramp 2.0

Jermyn Street's iconic club has reopened after a 12m makeover, so can it restore its A-list magic? Jonathan Prynn takes a first look

- Jonathan Prynn

FOR more than 50 years it was the West End’s high temple of decadence, a venue that only welcomed the “exceptional , glamorous and famous”, where Rolling Stones and royalty, Beatles and Bonds dined, drank and danced together. Then suddenly last November, just days after Idris Elba launched his rosé champagne Porte Noire there, Tramp was gone.

Since then, the Jermyn Street club where Keith Moon swung from the chandelier (getting himself barred for a fairly token 48 hours in the process) has been swathed in scaffolding and hoardings as it undergoes its biggest makeover since it first opened in 1969. But in mid-September the wraps will come off and Tramp will be back — under new ownership and management. But will it ever be able to recreate the magic formula that made it the retreat where celebrities felt most comfortable letting their hair down?

The future of Tramp now rests in the hands of its new proprietor, an effervescent Ital ian banker- turned-nightlife entrepreneur called Luca Maggiora who has invested about £12 million in making Tramp fit for the mid 2020s and beyond.

Maggiora, who bought Tramp from Scottish businessman Kevin Doyle after pestering him with emails for two years, says: “I only wanted this place because of the history and the Britishness. It did not have the best reputation for the past 10 or 15 years, it’s like everything in life — if you stop giving love to a place or a marriage, the place is going to go down, the marriage is going to break.”