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London's Knight Club brings chess and chatter to a new generation
Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on June 6, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 23, 2026
Global Banking & Finance Review®
Company
Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on June 6, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 23, 2026
Knight Club in London merges chess with music, attracting young players weekly. It offers a social alternative to digital life, fostering connections.
By Ethan Flynn-Johnson and Marissa Davison
LONDON (Reuters) - Combining dance music, some social media buzz and one of the world's oldest pastimes, London chess group Knight Club draws dozens of players each week, creating a social space its organisers say is much-needed by the city's younger generations.
The club has quickly grown into a cultural hub since launching last year, drawing over 100 players to its weekly Tuesday sessions where live DJ sets compete with the clatter of chess pieces on boards.
In a world dominated by digital communication, the club - run largely by volunteers under the age of 25 - wants to offer a physical alternative to scrolling on screens.
"Having a game, or having something to bond over, or to start a conversation, enables really deep connections to be made from the get-go," said 21-year-old organiser Lucia Ene-Lesikar.
"There's a lot of creative people, but there's also people who work in finance or work in tech or work in healthcare - so there's a whole range of people."
The club's appeal lies not just in the game itself, but in how it provides something modern life is often missing, founder Yusuf Ntahilaja told Reuters.
"Knight Club, first and foremost, is a space for people to connect and gather - chess being the medium and the most important way to connect - but more than anything, just providing ... a basic, or societal, human need," he said.
(Reporting by Ethan Flynn-Johnson and Marissa Davison, writing by Sam Tabahriti, editing by William James)
Knight Club is a London-based chess group that combines dance music and social interaction, drawing dozens of players each week.
The club is run largely by volunteers under the age of 25, aiming to provide a physical alternative to digital communication.
The appeal lies in its ability to foster deep connections among diverse individuals, including those from finance, tech, and healthcare.
Knight Club meets every Tuesday, attracting over 100 players to its sessions.
The main goal is to create a space for people to connect and gather, using chess as a medium for social interaction.
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