Alpine Club

Founded in 1857 it was as its name would suggest a club specifically for mountaineers. The club's first premises were at 8 St. Martin's Place, just off Trafalgar Square, where it rented rooms in 1858. In 1895 it relocated to 23 Savile Row, where it remained until 1937. From then until 1990 it was based at 74 South Audley Street in Mayfair, London when the club sold its lease before moving to its current abode at Charlotte Street near Old Street Underground. Mountaineers have historically carried sketchbooks on their many trips and a huge collection of paintings and drawings have been amassed and deposited in the club's archive. Throughout its existence, the club had also been used as an exhibition venue with famous and relatively unknown artists showing there. Other societies have used the club premises for meetings. These include the Friday Club and the Dudley Gallery Art Society. The club is still going strong well into the millennium.

In December 1907, a group of ladies who were climbers in the Alps met in London and agreed to form a new club, similar to the long-established Alpine Club, which at the time did not accept women members on account of their supposed physical inabilities in mountain climbing. The Ladies Club's first president was the Bishop of Bristol, and the second in 1908 was Elizabeth Le Blond (1860-1934).

The Alpine Club had long resisted admitting women members, and in 1973 an attempt to have this policy reversed was defeated, the necessary two-thirds majority had not been achieved. In May 1974, however, another vote was held and, despite the continued opposition of some individual male members women were finally allowed to join the club. This made the need for a separate women's club unnecessary. In 1975 the Ladies' Alpine Club merged with the Alpine Club, the latter gaining 150 new members. The merger was not universally popular, and 37 women resigned in protest in 1975 or soon after.

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