Night life: Greystone Manor, at your service
Just like one pop hit can revive the career of a fading diva, a makeover can breathe new life into a once-hot club. But often these remakes are so formulaic they just don’t bring the heat. The burn-and-turn club culture can see investors rally, decorators budgeted and velvet ropes unhinged in a matter of months — and then close just as quickly.
So what’s a proprietor to do? For SBE and their formerly hot Hollywood club Industry, the attempt at reinvention starts with philosophy.
Industry, a shadowy beast on La Cienega that once boasted clinical “performance poles” and a hidden gourmet burger bar, was shuttered in the spring and has just reopened as Greystone Manor, a lush supper club with a service standard more akin to a luxury hotel than the vodka-soaked shoe boxes lining the block. This is not to be confused with the well-known Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills.
“If you go back into the European supper club culture, it’s a space for eating and drinking but transforms into a space for performances. It becomes night life organically,” said SBE Senior Vice President Costas Charalambous.
It took significant elbow grease — the kind of bone-and-tissue work that makes it a “new space” — for Industry to become Greystone Manor. Interior designer Mark Zeff elevated ceilings to 20 feet and busted out the cattle-call watering stands for more intimate clusters, including a show-stopping horseshoe shaped bar that maximizes mingling.
A gilded-age look brightens up the ghost of Industry, with the venue’s lighting culminating in a massive cluster of six LED-powered chandeliers above the dance floor. But back to philosophy. In perhaps the most ambitious positioning of service for the night life circuit — table service transforms into a choreographed dance with a relatively large cast.
“We try to raise our standards every time we put something in the market,” Charalambous said, “At Greystone, waitresses remain at the table, they don’t leave. Orders and delivery are coordinated by assistants.”
This is for the expensive bottle service only, not dining, and even includes a butler.
Entertainment, coordinated by Mia Presley, involves morphing the typical go-go dancer into a character native to Greystone, or “nymph,” both on the floor and doing aerial maneuvers.
The reception so far has been positive, as curiosity is high. Even Jennifer Lopez’s management team approached the venue to host her official post-American Music Awards bash last Sunday.
Talk about a lady who knows reinvention.
Greystone Manor
Where: 643 N. La Cienega Blvd.
When: Dinner service begins at 6 p.m. Club from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m.
Price: No cover
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