A plan to replace a defunct club along one of the busiest roads in Reading with 30 flats and a shop has been refused.
The Curzon Club at 362 Oxford Road has been closed since the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 and has never reopened.
It was previously used as a private members club and hireable venue with two bars, a dance floor and accommodation.
The club was put on the market for £695,000 in December 2020.
Following that sales process, development company City Wide Serviced Apartments submitted an application to demolish the building and replace it with a new apartment block.
The new six-storey building would have contained 17 two-bed and 13 one-bed flats with a flexible unit on the ground floor.
The project was discussed at a Reading Borough Council planning applications committee meeting in December 2023.
At the time, councillor Karen Rowland (Labour, Abbey) praised the design of the apartment block by architect Chris Keen, who lives in Reading.
She said: “It’s well designed by a very local person who really is passionate about the area, I think it shows.
“It is a large development, it will be noticeable, it will be a formidable building, but I do think by the choice of materials that we’ve got a really good proposal here.”
Meanwhile, cllr Wendy Griffith (Labour, Battle), who represents the area, suggested that the ground floor could have been used for a community group.
The outline plans were approved subject to a section 106 legal agreement being reached between City Wide Serviced Apartments and the council.
These agreements define how much a developer must pay for council services.
An advert for an auction of the Curzon Club was published by Savills real estate agents in September 2024, which referred to the outline planning permission.
But the auction listing was ultimately withdrawn.
More than a year on, the outline permission has been rejected due to the failure of City Wide Serviced Apartments or any other company to enter into a s106 agreement with the council.
The refusal letter from the council states: “In the absence of a completed s106 legal agreement to secure an acceptable amount of affordable housing, the proposal fails to contribute adequately to the housing needs of Reading Borough and the need to provide sustainable, mixed and balanced
communities.”
The refusal notice was issued on October 15.
The letter later states that the refusal could be overcome with the completion of a satisfactory s106 legal agreement or unilateral undertaking.
City Wide Serviced Apartments has submitted five documents to Companies House since 2024, with the latest of these being submitted in August 2025.
Filings also mention compulsory strike-off in 2020 and 2022, placing the company at risk of abolition, actions which were averted on both occasions.
You can view the application by typing reference PL/22/1345 into the council’s planning portal.
