Fury as The Lazy Lion to become a Night Club

Locals are outraged at the news that The Lazy Lion is to become a Night Club.

Since unexpectedly closing its doors on the 23rd September 2024, The Lazy Lion pub has sat empty with forlorn beer pumps and the once popular restaurant sadly inoperative.

Speculation has been rife as to what was to become of this popular village pub situated in an historic Grade II Listed former eighteenth century coaching inn.

Many expected the pub to reopen as a bar and restaurant, but it appears that will not happen now.

Submitted artist's impression

The New Flim-Flam Night Club is part of The Imagine Entertainment Group and they have numerous venues across the UK.

Bobby Dazzle, general manager of the new night club said: "Our aim is to make the night club accessible to all and to become part of the local community. We are looking to cover a variety of genres of music during the week, and at weekends the club will focus on a mix of rave and grime music until we close at 2am. I have a lot of respect for local residents, so we will stop playing music from 1am during the week."

To fully utilise the building, during the day there will be dance classes for those who want to learn classic rave moves. The classes will be open to all ages and will be taken by Tommy Twinkle. Tommy also choreographed all the rave dance sequences on BBC's Strictly Come Dancing.

It is also understood that there is existing planning permission for an elevated decking area connected to the rear of the property extending to approximately 646 sq. ft. Flim-Flam has plans to make this into a jacuzzi complex for ravers when the night club is open. During the day, the facility will be available to local naturist groups.

Layout Plan for the Future Interior

Recently, a village protest group has been formed to lobby the New Forest District Council to reject the premises license application from Flim-Flam.

The group, Neighbours Against Flim-Flam (NAFF) is led by Ivor Issue who lives close to the back of the new venue.

Ivor commented, "This is not a welcome addition to the village and the pub will be sorely missed. The dance classes with Tommy Tinkle are all well and good and claim to be inclusive, but there is no mention of including those who love to rave but are now using walking frames."

Fellow local resident, Bill Peeper said, "It is going to be bad enough having banging music until into the early hours of the morning, but my real issue is that I will have to hang out of my window to see the naturists in the jacuzzi area during the day."

If you would like to join NAFF and have your views heard, please contact Ivor at ivor@ubeenhad.org.

PS: If you are interested in the original history of The Red Lion, please hit the button below:

The Lazy Lion

32 High Street, Milford on Sea, SO41 0QD