If there was anything missing from Trinity that further hindered our endless desire to procrastinate and generally faff about, it was something like The Parlour. Cold days that left us shivering by the cricket pitch or going numb in the various smoking areas eventually won the battle and herded us to the library in search of warmth. Not only does The Parlour provide such enticing safety from the elements that we have so striven to avoid, but it entertains us too.
What began as a dingy backroom in the JCR – a space in itself normally reserved for the Hamilton kids, being too far a trek for Arts bums – has been converted to a domain of “chill” happenings that appeal to Trinity students, enough so to drag them from all ends of campus to the various treats in store. Initially, the JCR team wanted to set up the space for small gigs, but when they collaborated with the man behind “Ponderbox”, “Electric Relaxation” and so on, Niall Morahan, they realised their opportunities were endless.
With a committee drawn from inside and outside the JCR, the Facebook plugging began. Eager future attendees were invited to follow the progress as photographic evidence of numerous artistic endeavours to convert the room into a stage for an assortment of student talent appeared. “Construction”, as the album was called, revealed glimpses of bronze chairs, upside-down tables, painted limbs, nips, faces and cups. We had no idea what to expect.
What we were greeted with during the launch week was a pleasant surprise. While the place currently lacks a bit of colour and is still quite obviously in its early days, Niall maintains that “the place itself will be a continual work in progress…sometimes the journey is its own destination.” The journey, as it stands, shows a lot of promise. Mostly black and white, but well lit, with some comfy couches and those slick (although unnervingly shaky) bronze chairs, the atmosphere is very chilled, comfortable and serves to distract you from what you’re supposed to be doing quite well. The art displays inside, while impressive, aren’t just on the walls – I reckon my favourite part of the entire decor was the tables which are covered in pages of old, rubbish books. Stolen from an unfortunate old bat who owns a mysterious bookshop in Goldsmith where the books themselves appear in hallways as opposed to shelves, the pages vary from bad poetry to diagrams of some kind of scientific nature – a nice touch to the room.
Jean-Pierre Léaud as Antoine Doinel
The idea behind The Parlour is to try out ideas and displaying talent in an arena unlike ENTS where the focus is big crowds, profit and general mayhem. They also hope to collaborate with other societies as they already have with Vis-Art and Digital art. They are reportedly “delighted” with the success of their opening week which gave students an idea of what’s to come in the future of The Parlour. Every day saw various students bopping in to demonstrate their DJ skills – arguably encouraging the very becoming attitude that everyone who likes music can, in fact, be a DJ, but very entertaining all the same, and those who did play music had obviously been chosen wisely as each set contributed to the chilled atmosphere of the venue. To pass the evenings, various arts films were shown such as all 5 of Francois Truffaut featuring the character Antoine Doinel, to name but a few – an apt addition to the artsy vibes.
The future of The Parlour looks bright as they plan to continue to spread the word and run some interesting events focused on art, comedy, music, drama and film, as well as some more food-orientated shindigs which are rarely seen around college these days. Their first “taste” of this kind of event went down a treat on Pancake Tuesday with a seemingly endless supply of pancakes popping around the room with a delightful array of toppings. Lovely.
So, it seems The Parlour is going to be quite the success in the upcoming year as they’ve started as they mean to continue – no bang, just a calm ease into the ”journey” ahead. It’s almost too easy to spend hours there as DJs change over and new people come and go. Tip: Getting a spot in one of the leather couches is pretty key to aid optimum food, art and music enjoyment plus chills. They’re still on the lookout for more people to get involved and encourage people to check them out or contact them on Facebook. Watch this space.
