Need to Know
10 : 03 : 23

UK – Shoreditch Arts Club is an ambitious new hybrid art gallery located in Shoreditch’s Tea Building, an iconic East London 1930s warehouse. Exclusive members can access the 500-square-metre space that includes several art exhibitions, a restaurant with a seasonal menu by in-house chef Mattia Luminelli, a cafe and bar, open dining, working and lounge areas, private dining and meeting rooms, a 24-seat cinema and a busy event and networking programme.

‘Since its inception, it was clear that the club should be a space for art although not a gallery,’ say co-founders Amr Assaad and Matt Yeoman, directors of the architecture firm Buckley Gray Yeoman. ‘Therefore, we had the idea to create an environment like an avid collector’s home.’ The annual membership fee is £750 ($893, €845), with an additional one-off joining fee of £150 ($179, €169).

We previously highlighted in Whisper Networks how spaces like Shoreditch Arts Club focus on experience-led micro-communities to uphold an aura of real-life exclusivity in the era of luxury omnipresence.

UK – A survey by Forbes Advisor in December 2022 of 2,000 UK adults aged over 18 reveals that nearly a third admit using credit cards to buy groceries and essential food items. Some 25% said they go into debt to pay for everyday items such as transport, lunch and drinks.

According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), food prices rose consistently for 17 months until December 2022 – when food price inflation was at its highest since September 1977. Inevitably, some households have no choice but to turn to credit to catch up.

‘Credit cards are a great servant, but a terrible master,’ says Laura Howard, a financial expert at Forbes Advisor. She adds: ‘Many households will be unable to clear their monthly balance. And with the effective credit card interest rate now at 19.55%, according to the latest Bank of England data, this only exasperates affordability problems for households.’

In our Cost of Living Crisis series, we have examined how organisations and brands in all industries are flexing their business operations to cater for customers facing a global cost of living crisis. Credit card companies must also rethink their approach as new clients are knocking on their door out of desperation.