Know your history - The Penthouse

Last month, the marquee outside the Penthouse featured a rather odd greeting: “Welcome Heritage Vancouver.” Could it be that local architecture buffs enjoy exotic entertainment as much as Howe Street stockbrokers? Possibly, but the shout-out was more a reflection of the fact that the Penthouse has one of the richest histories of any club in Vancouver.

Constructed in the 1930s, the building initially housed a radiator shop in the front and a garage for Diamond taxi cabs in the rear.

“That then evolved into the Eagle Time Athletic Club in the ’40s,” says Penthouse general manager Gwyn Roberts. “The main part of the Penthouse had a boxing ring in it. Joe Filippone, who started the Penthouse, got troubled kids off the street and got them into boxing. Then at night, he would throw these lavish parties in the upstairs part of the club, which was sort of his apartment. It was basically a booze can that was constantly raided by the police. That’s where the nickname Joe’s Penthouse originated.”

As his parties at 1019 Seymour Street became more and more infamous, Filippone transformed the venue into a semi-legitimate bottle club. “It was basically Vancouver’s big after-hours spot,” Roberts relates. “When the Cave and the Palomar would close, all the performers and guests would head to the Penthouse, which opened at 10 p.m. and then closed at 8 in the morning.”

In the ’50s, the location became a licensed supper club, with the Steak Loft upstairs and the Gold Room downstairs.

During this time (as well as the after-hours period in the late ’40s), the Penthouse played host to some of show business’s biggest icons: Sammy Davis Jr., Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, the Mills Brothers, Frankie Laine, and Carmen Miranda.

When burlesque became a big draw in Las Vegas in the ’50s and ’60s, the Penthouse followed suit, eventually becoming a full-fledged strip club in the ’80s. Since then, it has also won a reputation as one of the best live rooms in Vancouver. Although music isn’t its focus, over the past three decades, it has hosted everyone from local legends Slow to metal warrior Thor to indie oddball Bobby Conn.

“We’re back to the room being almost a kind of vaudeville-type place,” Roberts says. “Our strippers are our house band, though—they guarantee an audience. Until I find a house band that brings in 150 people a night, that’s not going to change.”