Draughts: London’s First Board Game Cafe

Tokyo might have its Monster Hunter and Final Fantasy themed cafes, but something is stirring in London that should have all gamers charging their Oyster cards in anticipation. Toby Hamand and Nick Curci are on the verge of opening London’s first board game cafe, called Draughts, in Hackney and have recently launched a Kickstarter to help put the finishing touches to the enterprise. This will include a library of over 500 board games, representing the choicest cuts from a medium that has exploded with creativity in the last ten years.

This is only the second board game cafe to open in the UK following the appearance of Thirsty Meeples in Oxford. Both cafes have taken a leaf out of the book of the successful Toronto-based haunt Snakes and Lattes, which opened in 2010 and has since become a subject of envy for gamers around the world, who wish they could have such a cool joint on their doorstep rather than the scraggly pile of battered ‘classics’ that you tend to find in pubs. Draughts wasn’t just inspired by the punny name of the Canadian venue (which is so cool it even has its own podcast), but hopes to capture some of the atmosphere that venue is known for.

Staff will be on hand to not only take your order, but to teach punters the rules of the games on offer

Situated under the arches of the railway line at Haggerston, the cafe will serve food, coffee and craft beers, as well as providing spacious tables for dozens of gamers to play into the night. Staff will be on hand to not only take your order, but to teach punters the rules of the games on offer and if you’re new to the hobby or looking for something different, their appropriate board game tube map will guide you to just the right game. Sitting down to play has a cover charge of £5, or £3.50 if you buy a year’s membership, which also gives you five free sessions off the bat. The venue will host tournaments, design workshops, game launches and more.

Board gaming has been rapidly gaining in popularity nationwide. My own weekly board game club in Norwich barely had a dozen members two years ago, and now thirty people is considered a quiet night and we’ve taken over most of the pub. Memberships seem to have swollen at clubs and conventions nationwide, meanwhile the UK Games Expo continues to grow year on year and is looking set to move into the NEC before long. A boom in creative game design, increased production quality and rapidly growing coverage of the medium online at sites like Shut Up and Sit Down and Will Wheaton’s massively popular show Table Top, is fuelling an unparalleled resurgence in analogue gaming. Most big videogame sites are covering board games now and you can check out our own review coverage of games like Bioshock Infinite and Space Cadets: Dice Duel.

We’ll be catching up with Nick and Toby in more depth later on, but in the meantime, if you love board games and good company and are within a dice roll of London then you owe it to yourself to get involved and back the Kickstarter.