Champagne, scandal, and lock-ins: What it was like to run Brasingamens, Alderley Edge’s lost celebrity superclub
It was home to lavish celebrity parties, sold more champagne than ANY other bar and had its fair share of scandals too.
Brasingamens in Alderley Edge was the most legendary nightspot in Cheshire ‘s Golden Triangle in the late 90s and early noughties, playing host to WAG fashion shows, footballer stag dos and the fizz-fuelled celebrations of the rich and the famous in the area.
Also known as The Braz, the bar rose to prominence in an era when Premier League footballers became bigger than rock stars – at a time when David and Victoria Beckham were locals and when « absolutely no jeans or trainers » door policies were still an actual thing.
READ MORE : The rise and fall of Mr Smiths – the Warrington venue loved by Manc clubbers
Scott Hannah was manager of the Braz from 2000 to 2006, and was tasked with providing the ultimate playground for the super-rich and super-famous.
(Image: Mirrorpix)
Scott says: « I grew up with family who had run Manchester clubs, but when I came out here, it felt like home.
« I felt like I belonged here, I understood what the clientele wanted.
« They wanted big nights, somewhere safe and good service – they wanted a community in a club and they had that at the Braz. »
Scott recalls that his clientele could be split into three distinct groups.
(Image: Scott Hannah)
« There were the Alderley Edge locals, wealthy individuals who felt like they owned everything because it was ‘their’ village, » he says.
« Then it was at that time the footballers moved in – and all of a sudden you got the « footballer money » moving out this way, as well as the « new money » – whoever was being successful in business at that time.
« And then you’d get the girls who wanted to meet those different groups of people. »
When Scott ran the club the door policy was over-25s only, with a « strict » dress code of no sportswear, no denim and no caps if you were hoping to get beyond the velvet rope and mingle with soap stars and footballers.
(Image: Eamonn and James Clarke)
Scott laughs: « If you didn’t make an effort you weren’t getting in, it seems crazy to think of it now, but we were one of the first clubs to allow jeans to come in.
« It was massive news at the time to make that policy change but a footballer pal of mine said to me ‘look I can go to Topman and buy a pair of trousers for £20 or I can buy these £300 designer jeans’ – and I thought yeah, he’s got a point. »
It certainly paid off to change that policy – looking back at some of the brilliant celebrity photos from the time – with the acres of designer denim that became de rigeur in the early noughties.
(Image: Eamonn and James Clarke)
But guests always had to look smart, Scott says.
So much so he went to extra lengths to help some VIP guests get past the door staff.
Scott recalls: « I had a customer, part of a well known wealthy family, who always came in his scruffs, so I kept a wardrobe in my office just so he could get changed into something smart when he came into the club – then on the Monday he’d bring the clothes back all dry cleaned. »
The champagne lifestyle
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The sheer wealth in the area meant eye-popping amounts of money were spent on booze in the club.
Scott says: « We were the biggest independent champagne buying bar in the country at that time. People thought nothing of spending £200 on bottles of Cristal.
« We were buying 600 bottles of champagne a week, and it was at a time when cocktails were just becoming trendy.
« We paid higher rates for Manchester staff to come down to Alderley to make the cocktails and pay for their taxis home because they were the best.
« You would look in the car park and you wouldn’t have a single car that wasn’t a supercar.
« On sunny days we’d create chaos because we’d hold a barbecue there and I’d SMS all my customers to say ‘restaurant closed, barbecue only, no tables reserved’, and everyone would turn up. »
Footballers, WAGs, supercars and a super yacht
Legendary parties at the venue included WAG fashion shows attended by Coleen Rooney and Dawn Ward, the stag do of football agent Dave Gardner with all his footballer pals – including David Beckham – and soap star and music after parties, including one which Pharrell Williams turned up to.
(Image: Eamonn and James Clarke)
Scott also recalls the time a huge YACHT parked up outside the Braz for a fashion bash, bringing traffic to a standstill through the village yet again.
With the venue’s prime location – on the main London Road through the village and right next to the main line train station – it soon caught the eye of the police.
Scott laughs: « We were hosting a big fashion launch for Forever Unique’s Seema and Sandeep [Malhotra] in 2004.
« We had a company who wanted to put a 55ft yacht on the car park which was hilarious in itself, but we stopped the whole of Aldeley Edge getting it into the car park.
(Image: Scott Hannah)
« The police turned up and said it had to go, it would cause a car accident, and said if we didn’t move it they’d get a warrant. I said ‘how long have I got?’ and they said ’til Monday’ so I said ‘no problem I’ll move it by then’, knowing it was going then anyway.
« Which meant we had a whole weekend of Mediterranean parties on it. »
When it all went VVIP
As the bar and upstairs club became increasingly popular, changes were made to reflect the ever-growing number of VIPs in attendance, with a huge refurb in 2005.
The bar launched a membership scheme, priced from £500 right up to £5,000 a year, which would secure you a table in the VIP area and a certain amount of champagne per year.
There was even a separate ‘secret’ door for the super-famous V-VIP folk to get in.
Scott recalls: « I used to have a guy called Dennis who was on the velvet rope [to VIP] and he’d work to my instruction.
« If you’re a member, a footballer or someone that we deemed was ‘worthy’ you got past the rope. »
And what made a person ‘worthy’ we ask? Scott laughs: « Good customers, nice people who treated the place right. Never the cocky or demanding types! »
As for the dress code, well, funnily enough the odd exception did get through the velvet rope – if they weren’t entirely in keeping with it.
Scott recalls: « There was one time when Paul Gascoigne turned up with a few of the Everton lads in vest, shorts and flip flops. I heard that the door staff were knocking him back, but I said no no let him in.
(Image: Getty Images)
« I took him upstairs to the VIP and sat with him most of the night hearing his stories and banter.
« So later on I decided to ask him why he had come dressed like that. He replied: ‘the lads said I’d never get in dressed like this – so I thought I’d show them I could!’
« I think that was one of my favourite ever nights at the club. »
The footballer parties
(Image: Eamonn and James Clarke)
With a veritable galaxy of Premier League stars living in the Alderley Edge area, the club became a hotspot for footballer celebrations during Scott’s tenureship.
He remembers that after United’s League Cup win over Wigan in 2005, the club became the unofficial after-party destination – and with a World Cup photoshoot taking place the next day, a host of England squad players joined the action too.
Scott says: « I’d always had the agreement with licensing officers that if we ever had a lock-in I was to ring them first. Lock-ins aren’t illegal, it’s the taking money that is illegal. We’d hold about 30 lock-ins a year.
« So we had this big footballer party and so I rang the licensing officer to let him know and he said ‘no problem, just keep it upstairs’ and I mentioned that John Terry would be coming.
« The officer said: ‘John Terry? Can I come and meet him?’ It turned out he was a massive Chelsea fan.
« So the next thing he turned up with his trousers pulled over his pyjama bottoms to the club, just so he could have a hug and an autograph! »
(Image: Getty Images)
After Peter Crouch’s infamous hat-trick in an England friendly at Old Trafford in 2006, it was to the Braz he headed with family and friends for a memorable night – where he reprised his famous robot dance moves.
Scott laughs: « We got him to do the robot on the dancefloor and it went off…. That was very cool. »
Cristiano Ronaldo lived in Alderley Edge on his first time around with United, and Scott remembers bending his own over-25s rule to let the young Ronaldo into the club.
Scott says: « He used to come in when he was 18, the over-25s was my rule, not the licensing rule. «
« »He used to come in with his cousin and he was always very quiet, very shy, he never drank, there’s nothing bad I can say about him.
« He was a beautiful guy, he used to come in on a Sunday and have a roast dinner with his mum. »
Sundays were Sintillate nights at the club, which would also attract a huge celebrity and footballer crowd.
(Image: Eamonn and James Clarke)
Scott says: « I remember looking around on one Sunday night and we counted 140 Premier League and championship footballers in the club – and we only had capacity for 400 in total. That’s just what it was like.
« The footballers were amazing though, genuinely, 99.9 per cent of the lads were top top drawer, they’d call in advance, they’d ask to book tables, they’d spend money, they were respectful. »
The scandals
However not all footballers and celebrities were quite so well behaved. Scott had to BAR one high profile premier league star for consistently bad behaviour inside the club.
And Scott says one very famous female star was also once ejected from the club with her famous boyfriend – after flashing her intimate areas to disgusted club-goers.
Scott says: « If you were lairy, or rude to the staff, you would get kicked out, it wouldn’t matter who you were. »
But by and large, despite some eyebrow-raising shenanigans inside the club upon occasion, Scott says very few stories ever leaked out to the press.
He says: « I was brought up that you look after your people, your friends and they look after you. »
The demise of the club
Scott decided to leave Brasingamens in 2006 when he and his partner found out they were expecting their first baby, with Joshua born later that year.
He now runs his own businesses in the corporate sector, and lives in Wilmslow with partner Alex and sons Joshua, 14, and Aidan, 10.
(Image: Scott Hannah)
Scott says: « It was a moment in time for me that I will never match again. My peers were the same age, we had the same interests and we’d socialise, I’d go to Marbella with the footballers in the summer, and they’d take me to New York in the January, it was a wonderful time in my life. »
The Braz, meanwhile, was to hold its last parties in 2007, amid a changing bar scene that saw Manchester’s VIP bar and club scene rise to prominence.
The bar collapsed into administration in 2007 blaming « cash flow problems », and was eventually snapped up by Manchester’s celeb-haunt success story Panacea.
But it was to be a doomed alliance for Panacea. Just days after their lavish opening at the Alderley site in September 2008, the building was gutted by fire.
After an extensive refurbishment it rose from the ashes, only to be gutted by another fire in March 2013.
It would be another couple of years before the venue was to reopen – this time as a Piccolino Italian restaurant on the ground floor with a YU restaurant in what was the nightclub upstairs.
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Fire was yet again to plague the site, with a blaze at Piccolino in January 2020 which saw the evacuation of diners inside.
But it was able to reopen again within weeks.
When lockdown restrictions eased in the summer, and with its huge outdoor terrace, Piccolino once again resumed its role as the hotspot for the local community – a place for Alderley Edge’s celebrities, millionaires and footballers to see and be seen.
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