Darts in the Banking Hall, Flight Club Lands on Union Square
A 1902 bank that once held the Zippers nightclub and Blue Water Grill gets a new game and two bars
The marble is still there. So is the mosaic floor, and the grand stair that drops from the old banking hall to the basement. What is new at 31 Union Square West are the dartboards, the ring lights, and the scoreboards that know exactly where your throw landed before you do.
Flight Club, the U.K.-born darts bar, is getting ready to open its first New York location in one of the most storied buildings on the square. The company that runs it in North America, State of Play Hospitality, has been aiming for a fall debut after several earlier target dates came and went. As of this week there is no official opening night. What Now New York reports that Google Maps lists October 16, which is as close to a date as anyone has.
A Building With a Past Life After Dark
The building went up in 1902 and 1903 as the headquarters of the Bank of Metropolis. That much is in the history books. The part that matters to this magazine came later. In the early 1980s the bank became a nightclub called Zippers. Then it turned into Metropolis, a high end restaurant with a club in the basement. In 1996 Blue Water Grill moved in and served oysters under the high ceilings for more than two decades.
Each tenant left its mark. Blue Water Grill added a mezzanine that cut the room down to size. According to Hoodline, citing Commercial Observer, the new operators tore that mezzanine out during the renovation. That opened the room back up to its marble walls and its old cornice ceiling. The original mosaic tiles survived. So did the marble staircase.
The space covers about 10,700 square feet across the ground floor and basement, with a patio on 16th Street. It is built for up to 309 guests, with two bars, a private event room, and a row of throwing lanes.
It has held a bank, an eighties nightclub, a basement scene, and a seafood palace.
Flight Club's people have said they go looking for historic, architecturally significant buildings on purpose. In Philadelphia the brand moved into the city's original stock exchange. In New York it found a bank that has already lived three or four nightlife lives.
How the Game Works
The format is called Social Darts. Groups take a lane, known in darts language as an oche, and play fast multiplayer games while a camera system tracks each dart and scores it on a screen. Nobody has to do math. Nobody has to know the difference between a treble twenty and a bullseye. Beginners and pub veterans end up on the same board, and the screen keeps everyone honest.
The look is a kind of whimsical Victorian English pub. The lanes are dressed in themes like hot air balloons, animals, and old time fairgrounds. There is cabochon lighting and plenty of carnival color. Across all its venues, the company says the bar is the centerpiece, and it shows.
The menu is built for sharing between throws. What Now lists guacamole, red pepper hummus, truffle Parmesan fries, buffalo chicken sliders, meatballs, tacos, flatbreads, and a smashburger. The cocktail list runs from fruity to smoky. On weekends there is a brunch, with mimosas, Bloody Marys, and an espresso martini tower that pours four at once.
The Square After Dark
Union Square has always been a strange nightlife neighborhood. It is a crossroads more than a destination, a place people pass through between downtown and Midtown. Venues like this one are betting that a game gives people a reason to stop and stay. A group can book a lane after work, order a round, and still be there at eleven.
Flight Club first opened in the United Kingdom in 2012 and now has eleven American venues, from Atlanta and Boston to Las Vegas and Seattle. New York will make twelve. The operators have said they want more Manhattan locations after this one.
The bet is part of a bigger shift in how the city goes out. Gallup polling cited by Hoodline shows the share of American adults who drink has fallen to a 90-year low, and plenty of people now want a night that comes with something to do. Darts, bowling, karaoke, and mini golf all sell the same idea. You come for the game, and the bar does the rest. Some of those concepts have struggled. Flight Club, by most accounts, is one that has kept growing.
Whether a darts hall can feel like a real New York night will come down to the room. And this room has a head start. It has held a bank, an eighties nightclub, a basement scene, and a seafood palace. Now it gets dartboards under the cornices and a crowd keeping score. For another downtown room that splits its night between floors, see our visit to the vault under Church Street.
