‘Dance to Save the World’ is the message that greeted newcomers to Britain’s first ecological nightclub, opened last night in London’s King’s Cross. The nightclub is called Surya – Sanskrit for Sun God – and is the brainchild of property developer Andrew Charalambous, who has invested over £1 million to open the club under his pseudo-name Dr Earth.
The club in Pentonville Road, Islington, north London, is not only kitted-out with waterless urinals, hemp curtains and a fair trade granite bar, it also has its own wind turbine and solar energy system, with plans to donate any surplus electricity to local residents.
The dance floor uses the concept of piezoelectricity, where crystals and ceramics create a charge to generate electricity form the pressure obtained from, in this case, simply dancing the night away. Not only is there a dance floor that converts dance-moves into an eco-movement, the nightclub posses rooms for hydroponics in order to demonstrate that you can grow different types of plants and vegetation inside you apartment or office blocks with the aid of hydroponic indoor gardening.
Surya have seemingly thought of everything – as you pass the light display set into the dance floor that glows Dance to Save the World, past the fair trade bar where you can be served organic spirits into polycarbon cups, down through towards the toilets, you’ll find another initiative – the urinals. The urinals use a powerful air suction device that removes your waste and saves between 60 and 90 gallons of water per urinal, per day.
The club also requests would-be entrants to sign a pledge agreeing to work against climate change before they’re allowed past the velvet rope. And once they’re inside the club, the DJ better keep playing good music if he wants his turntables to keeping working because Surya estimates its clubber’s movement to generate 60% of the nightclub’s energy.
Mr Charalambous, who has promised to donate a proportion of his profits to charity, has stirred local MPs by pointing to the need for action: “Unless we stop preaching to people and use an inclusive philosophy we’re never going to create the revolution to combat climate change.
“It’s also about creating avenues of thought. Imagine what we could achieve if big corporations adopted this kind of initiative.”
It'll cost £10 to get in, but that charge will be waived if you can prove you came by foot, bicycle or public transit. Future plans include recycled water for the toilets, and community campaigns mixed into AV projection sets. And with more and more celebrities signing up for the guest list, it will be good to see Dr Earth re-using their fame to gain more public interest.
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This post was written by Ryan Whatley on July 16, 2008