#WeAreTheBlackCap protest outside the Black Cap on Camden High St, April 18 2015
The #WeAreTheBlackCap campaign, which opposes the closure of the iconic Camden LGBTQ venue the Black Cap, has called on the Cap’s freeholders to engage with the community to break the deadlock over the shuttered pub.
“We invite you to meet with us, and together harmoniously discuss how to get this famous pub re-opened,” writes leading campaign member and Camden LGBT Forum director Nigel Harris in an open letter addressed to Black Cap freeholders Kicking Horse Ltd and its partner, Vollin Holdings Ltd.
The letter from #WeAreTheBlackCap (of which I am a member) puts the onus on the companies to act because as the legal owners “only yourselves have the authority to take any decisive next step regarding the pub’s future”.
It also points out the harm the closure has done to London’s LGBTQ community, and the resulting damage to Kicking Horse’s reputation.
And the letter highlights ongoing financial losses resulting from the closure to parties including: the owners of the pub, which the letter estimates to have been turning over up to £900,000 a year; Camden council and central government, who are losing tax revenue; and local performers and bar staff who have lost employment.
The pub and cabaret venue was closed suddenly in April following repeated failed attempts by the owners to get planning permission for flat conversions.
It later emerged that since 2014, Kicking Horse had been pursuing a scheme to sell the historic pub – one of London’s oldest LGBTQ venues – for redevelopment as flats and a restaurant.
This, according to Camden Securities LLP, who were due to buy the Cap, would “enhance the value of the building”.
The Breakfast Club was in talks to open a branch at the site.
However, things haven’t gone to plan for the developers. As the open letter puts it, Kicking Horse and Vollin Holdings’ “planning consultants, legal advisors, and the people you paid to represent you… have quite simply failed”.
The sudden closure of the Black Cap sparked an outcry that became a protest campaign, leading to considerable media coverage and ongoing weekly vigils outside the pub.
A petition to reopen the pub has attracted nearly 8,000 signatories and #WeAreTheBlackCap has thousands of social-media followers.
Camden council recognises the site as an asset of community value, making it very hard to reopen as anything other than a pub. The council recently rejected an attempt by Kicking Horse and pub operator Faucet Inn to overturn that status. The open letter cites legal precedent to suggest that further such appeals by the owners would be likely to fail.
For a time, the vacant pub was occupied by squatters, who put on a couple of performance parties that aimed to keep alive the sense of the site as a space of queer culture and community.
The planned sale of the property to Camden Securities now appears to have fallen through, leaving the freeholders with a shuttered venue and no obvious route forward.
The open letter assures Kicking Horse and Vollin Holdings that a clear demand exists for a reopened Black Cap and offers to “work with you to advertise a new tenancy and assist shortlist tenant applications” or, should they decide to sell the site, “help you find a new buyer willing to take on a profitable [ACV] listed pub serving the LGBT community”.
Kicking Horse Ltd is based in Jersey and Vollin Holdings Ltd in Cyprus.
