Be At One - Greek Street — Restaurant in London

If you’re looking for a venue in Soho that actively discriminates against LGBTQ+ individuals, look no further than Be At One Greek Street. What should have been a fun night out with friends quickly turned into an infuriating display of double standards, ignorance, and outright discrimination.

We arrived on Thursday evening with a pre-booked table, yet the staff seemed completely unaware of our reservation, making us wait unnecessarily before seating us. Unfortunately, that was just the beginning of a series of incidents that made it clear Be At One is not a safe or welcoming space for LGBTQ+ customers.

As soon as we entered, my male friend—who openly presents as gay—took off his jumper, revealing a solid vest/tank top. No mesh, nothing provocative, just his arms and shoulders exposed. Within moments, a member of security approached him and said, “Can you put some clothes on?”

Confused and caught off guard, we asked why. The security guard gave no real explanation, simply stating, “I don’t make the rules.” Yet, as we looked around, it was obvious that many other customers—women—were wearing bralettes, crop tops, and outfits exposing just as much, if not more, skin. Not a single one of them was asked to “put some clothes on.”

Still, we tried to brush it off, got escorted to our table in the corner of the bar, and were given our complimentary bottle of Prosecco. But the harassment didn’t stop there. Security came over again to demand that my friend cover up, despite the glaringly obvious double standard.

Over the course of the evening, we had four to five different security guards approach us, as if my friend’s vest was some kind of scandalous offense. My friend made it clear he’d be happy to comply if the rule was enforced equally, but of course, it wasn’t.

One particularly vile security guard took things even further, repeatedly asking my friend, “But are you a girl?” as if that had any relevance. He wouldn’t let any of us speak, shutting down any attempt to question why this rule only seemed to apply to my friend. Instead, we were told, “Follow my rules, or he’s getting kicked out.” When we asked to speak to a manager, we were refused and told we could only do so after we left—as if they wanted to sweep this blatant discrimination under the rug.

To top it all off, we were then fed some ridiculous excuse about how a girl recently died because of what she wore on a night out at Be At One. How this was remotely relevant to our situation is beyond comprehension. It felt like a desperate attempt to justify their clear bias against a gay man for daring to wear a vest—something that would have been perfectly acceptable on a straight man or a woman.

By this point, we had lost any desire to stay. It was humiliating, infuriating, and deeply upsetting to watch my friend be singled out, embarrassed, and harassed simply for how he presents himself. And in Soho—one of London’s most famously LGBTQ+ friendly areas—this kind of discrimination feels even more disgusting. Be At One Greek Street should be a place where everyone is welcome, but instead, it has made it crystal clear that LGBTQ+ individuals are treated as second-class customers.

When we finally spoke to the manager, Rob, upon leaving, his response was just as disappointing. He didn’t seem to have an issue with what was being enforced—only with how it was communicated. That says everything. Management at Be At One Greek Street is more than happy to uphold sexist and homophobic double standards, and rather than address the clear discrimination, they prefer to smooth things over with empty apologies.

If you care at all about fairness, inclusivity, and basic human decency, avoid Be At One Greek Street at all costs. Spend your money somewhere that actually welcomes you, instead of a place that goes out of its way to embarrass and police LGBTQ+ customers while letting everyone else do as they please.

To add, I’ve attached the “scandalous outfit my friend was wearing (left) Next to our other female friend (right). The double standards...

To who it may concern,

Extremely disappointed with a 21st birthday celebration that we unfortunately won’t be able to get back and now feels like a wasted night out and a sh*t end to a birthday.

Came to the Greek Street (Soho) venue as have visited on plentiful occasions and enjoyed every single night. Despite this, tonight wasn’t up to standard, only difference for us was all being dressed in bright pink outfits. From the start, with minimal drinks as this was suppose to be the start and end of our “night out” from about 11 o’clock, the vibe was not right and we’d been asked if everyone was fine despite not being anywhere near intoxicated (be at one was going to be our place to celebrate and have drinks). We were allowed in and felt watched from the minute we entered, to be fair we weren’t hard to miss in bright pink, and one of our girls went to the toilet and was forced to leave following this by the welfare officer on 19.8.21. She felt she was too short to see her way through the talk crowd and was being shown (through a hand hold) to the toilets by one of our friends. Tried to explain ourself ( about 2 drinks in to the venue) to the staff and fell on deaf ears until we got outside and talked to an understandable lady of the security team. She heard our case deemed we were in a fine condition and said she’d talk to the management for us.

We were allowed back in after a 10 minute “break” and immediately the security were following us around. Some of our girls went to the toilet and were told “I’m watching you” whilst everyone else waited. Following this comment we were extremely unhappy with the team and asked for the welfare officers name. She refused to give her name and demanded to go through our phones for pictures of her that we didn’t take and forced her way through the camera roll to check for photos that didn’t exist. She said “my name is none of your business” and “I’m not giving you my name to post all over google reviews”. At this point we decided that the attitude and behaviour of the welfare/ security team was unacceptable and we decided to leave. We went upstairs to ask the door team for the welfare officers name and we’re followed upstairs by the same lady and she said forcefully tried to remove us from the venue whilst we tried to enquire about her. One girl was grabbed on her arm and attempted to be dragged towards the door.

When outside we talked to the same security lady from before who heard our case and was able to get the GM for us to talk to about how unacceptable the behaviour was towards us. This black and female (hopefully you can pinpoint them) security guard deserves some praise for actually listening and supporting our complaint towards management about their third party welfare team.

Ultimately extremely unhappy with our 21st birthday celebration. The venue was a usual go to spot and recommended by one of our group but now the excitement and welcomes don’t feel the same. Have had 1 other problem with be at one with security regarding unacceptable racial profiling and unjustified dress code complaints around Christmas time 2022 in Clapham high street. I hope we can speak to someone further about tonight in more detail. Cant complain about the drinks (excellent as always) but other than a complaint about tonight, would like to discuss a form of reimbursement for the £15 entries. 7 of us were driven out and forced to cut a 21st celebration short. On cctv we aren’t difficult to spot all being in bright pink outfits and can provide additional information for a follow up discussion. Apologies for the long complaint but look forward to your...

RUINED MY 21ST!!!! My group of 7 paid £15 each (£105) to be kicked out after an hour because a staff member targeted one of my friends and said she was too drunk to be in there - she wasn’t. We’d had no more than 2 drinks each and had been to mini golf before we came here so definitely were not heavily intoxicated. Me and my friends all arrived wearing pink for some fun and will never do something like that again, we were targets right from the start! As soon as a friend of mine went to the toilet she was taken away by this lady and told she needed fresh air only for us to not be let back in. After pleading with the security to be let back in we were told we were on our final warning (even though we hadn’t actually done anything in the first place). I personally was told I was “being watched” by the staff member in the toilets. I then came out and took a picture of my boyfriend, this lady raced over thinking I had taken a picture of her as she was hanging around us waiting for us to do something worthy enough to kick us out again. She demanded I opened my phone to delete the picture I had taken of her - to her dismay when she realised she actually wasn’t really in the picture at all (even taking the opportunity to swipe to make sure). When I asked for her name, she refused to give it to me and told me it was “none of my business” straight after demanding to look through my phone? Other staff outside also refused to give her name and told me that she doesn’t have to give it over. When I got fed up and came upstairs to ask other staff for a manager, she aggressively ushered the rest of my group out of the building and then tried to shout at me to get out as well, when I ignored her as I was talking to the other staff members she grabbed my arm and told me to leave. When talking to the manager, she was apologetic, however just blamed it on the fact that their security is a third party company and not their own staff. She then said that is the second complaint they’d had against this lady tonight and she won’t be coming back. If this is the second complaint you’ve had tonight then why are we the ones being sent home instead of her? We weren’t offered our money back - we had paid a lot just to simply be in the building to get kicked out just for dancing on the dance floor with everyone else, none of us were heavily intoxicated to be told that we weren’t allowed to be in there. We had not split any drinks, fallen over, stumbled around, or thrown up. There was no reason for us to be treated the way we were and the security woman outside even said that my friend who was “too intoxicated” was actually fine. Our night was cut very short as by the time all of this had happened it wasn’t even 1am, the queues for anywhere else were massive, we would’ve had to paid entry a second time for somewhere else - we were all feeling very deflated and decided to go home. Do not spend your money here - go somewhere else. I have never been treated like this in a club ever and neither have any...