Fez In Jeopardy

The owners of Fez club are waiting with bated breath to discover whether or not the club will be forced to shut down after plans were submitted to renovate the building it occupies.

If the planning application goes through, three floors of the historic Joshua Taylor department store will be transformed into flats and a restaurant.

It looks like this could mean an end for Fez, as an accompanying heritage statement declared that: “parts of the first and second floor are currently occupied by a nightclub, which is proposed to be removed.”

The news has some students worried. History student Andrew Payne said: “I won’t be able to sleep until I know the outcome of this. If Fez shuts, my life will lose all meaning.”

Fez recently celebrated its 10th birthday, but has not been without controversy

Yet Ian Freeman, spokesman for Eclectic Clubs and Bars who own the Fez and Lola Lo chains, insisted nothing has been decided yet.

He told The Tab: “We have been notified by the landlords about the application, but there’s no point going further until we know what the outcome of that will be.”

Many feel Eclectic Clubs may be in denial though, with the future for Fez now looking bleak. The case officer for the application has said he understood the club would be moving, and others have suggested that it may disappear all together.

Cambridge is now only one of two Fez clubs to remain in the UK, which used to boast many branches of the chain running from Bristol to Sheffield.

 Nights like this at Fez could soon be a thing of the past…

The only hope for Fez fans is that the club will be re-branded in line with the renovation plans, possibly to fit into the new restaurant space. A source said that the closure and re-branding of the clubs has: “been on the books since earlier this year”.

But devoted students think that would be a poor second-best. Emily Brewster, a 2nd year from Queens’, said in dismay: “Fez just wouldn’t be the same if it became a restaurant or anything more mainstream. We’ve already got Revs crossing the boundary between club and restaurant, and there are plenty of decent places to eat all over Cambridge. In some ways it would be better if it just shut completely.”