Archie's

History

A lap dancing bar on Botchergate, next door to House of Vodka on the side towards the Woodrow Wilson. The name is on the door; almost nothing else about it is written down anywhere.

That is the notable thing about it, and it is worth explaining rather than glossing. Adult entertainment of this kind normally needs a sexual entertainment venue licence, granted annually under the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1982, advertised in the local press and on a notice outside the premises. Carlisle's register of those licences carries exactly one entry, SEV01, held by Rouge in Englishgate Plaza a few doors along.

So either this venue's licence has not reached the published register, or it trades under a different name on it, or it runs under the exemption that allows relevant entertainment less often than once a month, to audiences under a hundred, without an SEV licence at all. Nothing found settles which.

It joins a dense run: House of Vodka next door, the old Walkabout building and Felson's opposite, Ballers, Deja Vu, the Unit and Rouge in the plaza, Box Arena behind. The top of Botchergate is the most heavily licensed corner of the city.

Widely repeated locally, but we haven't found a source for it yet. Know one?