Auckland's CBD is getting a new kind of night out. The Wyndham Club, opening on Wyndham St early next month, crams three things into one restored heritage floor: a 60-seat Japanese restaurant called Tempo, six high-tech Golfzon golf simulators, and social darts rooms — all dressed up in mid-century interiors with a Japanese twist.
The venture is the work of three partners with very different résumés. Chef Matt Ross, who sold his award-winning K Road tapas spot Candela last year, is back with his first restaurant since. He's teamed with Ned Gow — a musician and property man who played drums in indie band No Cigar and grew up around the family fine art business Gow Langsford — and Sydney-born investor Kirk Bayvel, who co-founded the Gravity NZ trampoline park chain and has a soft spot for renovating old buildings.
Their canvas is the former Auckland Gas Company building, with a Victorian facade dating to the 1870s. The pair bought it last June and had it under contract within a day; the first floor previously housed nightclubs Centro and Infinity. Gow reckons the neighbourhood is finally humming again now the City Rail Link has opened and the Albert St roadworks are done.
On the food side, Ross is cooking izakaya-style bar food: gyoza, karaage chicken, charcoal-grilled steaks and market fish, with dishes running $15 to $30 and a $30 express lunch of rice bowls and abura soba (soupless ramen). The lower lounge bar pours cocktails, and there's even caviar service — Black Russian Sturgeon on ice with toasted shokupan and crème fraîche. Laura Lopez, formerly of The Nightcar and Goblin, runs the bar programme.
The tech is the real draw for golfers. The partners travelled to Seoul to visit Golfzon's 33-storey head office, and the resulting six simulators feature an automatic ball feeder, an optional AI caddy and fairway, rough and bunker surfaces to hit from. Golf costs $70 an hour per bay; darts are $18 per person per hour. The darts concept borrows from Flight Club, the social darts franchise the trio have sampled in London, Perth and Sydney.
The venue holds 180 people and can be booked whole or by area for events and corporate functions, with limited Founding and Corporate memberships on offer alongside general admission. DJs play four nights a week, with live music sessions on Sundays.
Why care? The city's simulator-and-darts scene has exploded lately — Flush Golf, The Golf Lounge, La Di Darts and Sports and Rec have all opened recently — but The Wyndham Club is trying to be more than a games arcade. With serious kitchen credentials, design-led interiors and a proper cocktail bar, it's pitched at everyone from families and golf nerds to corporates after a team night that isn't ten-pin bowling. If you're in Auckland, it's an easy option for a dinner-then-games evening without leaving the building.
NZ Herald Travel
