Saturday 26th February

As Mardi Gras reaches its fever pitch in New Orleans, we bring a little of the Big Easy to our speakeasy.

New Orleans is the birthplace of jazz and a town that knows how to party—when Prohibition came the city paid little attention and just let the good times roll. Crack Prohibition agent Izzy Einstein used to gauge the challenge he would face policing a town by seeing how long it took him to get a drink when he arrived: in New York it took 14 minutes; in New Orleans it took 37 seconds.

In the run-up to Mardi Gras they really let rip, with a festival of masks, costumes, parades and music. Dozens of "Krewes" spend all year putting displays together and as they process through the city they fling trinkets, specially minted coins and strings of gold, purple and green beads from their floats into the crowd. We’ll have those at our party too, and we’ll be projecting New-Orleans-set vintage movies and original footage of the city in the Jazz Age.

Our food and drink menus will feature classic New Orleans cocktails and cuisine, and there will be live New Orleans music from the Candid Jug Orange Band, DJing from the Bee's Knees and cabaret from our King of the Carnival, Champagne Charlie. Down in the basement our Voodoo seer Lucius and will be ready to tell your fortune.