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Among the most energetic locations on a weekday evening in the East End's famous street isn't a restaurant or a streetwear label pop-up, it's a chess club – or rather a chess and nightlife combination, to be exact.

This unique venue embodies the unlikely crossover between chess and the city's fervent evening entertainment scene. It was founded by a young entrepreneur, 27, who began his first chess club in August 2023 at a smaller bar in a nearby area, a short distance from the present location at Café 1001 on Brick Lane.

“My goal was to create chess clubs for individuals who share my background and people my age,” he explained. “Typically, chess is only placed in environments that are full of senior individuals, which is not diverse enough.”

On the first night, there were only eight boards between sixteen people. Today, a “good night” at the weekly club event will draw approximately two hundred eighty attendees.

At first glance, the venue feels more like a DJ event than a chess club. Cocktails are being served and music is playing, but the game boards on each table aren't just ornamental or there as a novelty: they are all in use and encircled by a queue of spectators eagerly anticipating for their chance to play.

Jimmy Ifenayi, in her mid-twenties, has frequented Knight Club often for the last four months. “I had little understanding of chess prior to my first visit, and the initial occasion I ever played, I competed in a game against a grandmaster. That was a quick victory, but it made me fascinated to study and continue enjoying chess,” she said.

“This gathering is about half networking and half participants genuinely wanting to engage in chess … It is a nice way to unwind, which doesn't involve visiting a club to meet others my age.”

An Activity Reborn: Chess in the Contemporary Era

In recent years, chess has been cemented in the cultural zeitgeist. Its appeal of digital chess expanded rapidly during the pandemic, establishing it as one of the most rapidly expanding internet games in the world. In popular culture, the Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit, along with Sally Rooney’s recent novel Intermezzo, have created a distinct imagery associated with the sport, which has drawn in a new wave of enthusiasts.

But much of this newfound attraction of the chess club isn't necessarily about the technicalities of the play; rather, it is the ease of social interaction that it facilitates, by pulling up a seat and engaging with a person who may be a total unknown individual.

“It's a great clever disguise,” said one organizer, founder of a local venue in London, a bookstore, library, coffee house and lounge, which has hosted a well-attended chess club every Wednesday since it began four years ago. Freud’s aim is to “remove chess from its elite status and make it feel similar to billiards in a dive bar”.

“It is a really simple tool to meet people. It kind of removes the pressure of the need of small talk away from socializing with people. One can do the awkward bit of making an introduction and chatting to a new acquaintance over a board instead of with no kind of shared activity around it.”

Expanding the Network: Social Gatherings Outside the Capital

Elsewhere in the UK, a similar initiative is a recurring chess night taking place at a city cafe, just outside the city centre. “We found that individuals are looking for places where one can go out, interact and enjoy a fun evening outside of visiting a bar or nightclub,” said its creator and coordinator, Karan Singh, in his early twenties.

Together with his associate a partner, also young, he purchased chessboards, created promotional materials and started the chess club in the start of the year, while in his final year of college. In less than a year, he said their event has grown to draw more than 100 youthful players to its gatherings.

“A chess club has a particular connotation associated with it, about it seeming reserved. Our approach is to move in the contrary way; it's a convivial get-together with chess involved,” he emphasized.

Discovering and Engaging: An Alternative Generation of Chess Enthusiasts

For many, chess clubs are an introduction to the game. Zoë Kezia, in her late twenties, is learning how to play chess with fellow visitors of chess night at Reference Point. She became curious in the game was piqued after an pleasurable evening moving to music and engaging in chess at a previous Knight Club's occasions.

“It is a unique idea, but it works,” she said. “It encourages face-to-face exchanges rather than digital pastimes. It is a free neutral ground to encounter strangers. It is welcoming, one doesn't need to necessarily be good at chess.”

Kezia jokingly compared the trendiness of chess among the youth to the facade of the “performative male”, an attempt to feign braininess while projecting the appearance of “hipness”. Whether the chess craze has cultivated a authentic passion in the sport isn't a notion she is quite convinced by. “It is a positive phenomenon, but it’s largely a fad,” she observed. “Once you're playing against opponents who are really dedicated about it, it quickly becomes less fun.”

Competitive Play and Togetherness

It may seem like a bit of lighthearted activity for individuals aiming to use a game set as a networking tool, but competitive participants do have their place, even if away from the main party area.

Lucia Ene-Lesikar, 22, who assists in organise Knight Club,explains that more competitive attenders have established a league table. “Participants who are in the league will face one another, we will go to quarter-finals, advanced stages, and then we'll eventually have a league winner.”

A dedicated player, in his twenties, is a serious competitor and chess teacher. He joined in the league for about a year and participates at the club almost weekly. “This is a nice option to engaging in intense chess; it provides a sense of community,” he expressed.

“It is fascinating to observe how it becomes more of a communal activity, because in the past the only people who played chess were people who didn't socialize; they simply stayed home. It's usually only two people playing on a game board …

“The thing appeals to me about this place is that one isn't actually facing the digital opponent, you are engaging with real people.”