Are Our Roaring 20s Over or Am I Just Old? A Eulogy for The Jane
The Jane Ballroom in the Jane Hotel on Jane Street — commonly referred to as The Jane — never failed to provide the boring with stories and the interesting with cocaine, though I’d recommend partaking in neither. But now, with The Jane long gone, I can’t help wondering if that ballroom was less a place than an Era— and if the lack of it has hit me harder than expected.
Because— oh, the memories…
Once upon a not-so-long-ago Saturday, the line outside The Jane wrapped neatly around the block, offering latecomers nothing but the West Side Highway and a water bottle full of vodka for comfort. If you were lucky, the line led to a bored but chic man in chicer shoes and an even chicer coat, who’d nod at your ID without checking whether your photo looked like it was taken during the Bush administration. But other nights — especially during “special events” for “special people,” whomst I, at 23, was not — you stood at the mercy of whoever was running the door, which is to say someone with an iPad and a god complex.
Inside and after posting a completely illegible 7-second video with the caption “vibes” to my story (nobody cares), I elbowed my way to the bar for two vodka sodas. Two of them. Always two. Even if I’m alone. Especially if I’m alone.
My worldly friend, who is beautiful in a sophisticated sense (as in, she could marry a duke or at least someone with a Paris Review subscription), was already lounging on the back cushions, deep in conversation with a man she thought might buy our second round.
“He,” she told me, “works in fashion. And he made the very pants he’s wearing.” She had a tendency to drone as well as she draped. Admirable.
I had no need to feign interest — the pants were, undeniably, dope. And for once, we didn’t need the promise of free drinks to entertain the company. That was The Jane’s magic: no matter how ridiculous the premise, how sweaty the dance floor, how impossible the line, you always found yourself somewhere you’d want to remember — even if you couldn’t remember it the next day. And after my twenties had been chipped away by a worldwide illness — and no, I’m not talking about the unstoppable prevalence of the word “vibe” — The Jane felt like the life I’d been promised after lockdown. Something debaucherous. Something that wanted to harken back to the roaring twenties or the 80’s clubs my parents told me about (in stories with large chunck missing, the “I’ll tell you when you’re older” glaze over their eyes).
Soon, pants-man summoned his pack: well-dressed, well-lubricated (with liquor, they were tipsy — no one just lubed up at The Jane until the sun was tickling the balls of the horizon), and more than happy to provide drinks and tales of poorly moderated self-importance. Instagrams and numbers were exchanged and promptly forgotten. We led them from the bar to the ballroom, the line of us snaking through the crowd.
And oh — the ballroom.
The Jane’s ballroom was fucking exceptional. Dotted with velvet couches and “tables” that held fewer glasses than dancers, it had all the trappings of a stupidly glamorous speakeasy and none of the authenticity. When you tired of men trying and failing to dance with you (or dance in general), you could flee up the grand double staircase to the mezzanine, where the crowd was as high as their credit scores. If you took a deep breath, you could smell the platinum Amexes from deep in shallow pockets. (What’s the point of a platinum if you can’t whip it out? If the stories are true, it’s the only sizable thing those men could whip out of their pants.)
Up there, where you and the vape clouds became one, you could really appreciate the disco ball — spinning like a forbidden piñata — and the conversations that floated up above the music. Who people were, what they did, who they did, and where they were going next. Every few minutes, you caught a semblance of a full sentence, which is how I met an actor who’d just booked a national toothpaste commercial, a realtor desperately seeking a hookup (for coke, which I did not have), and, yes, a man who owned a monkey.
On this particular night, my worldly friend found herself in the company of an ambassador’s son, while I found myself deep in conversation with, naturally, another ambassador’s son. Their entire group — diplomats’ children, a quiet banker, the one whose family name is internationally recognized and thus shan’t be mentioned, and Frenchmen from enough provinces to fill a cheeseboard— had arrived together.
The crowd thinned, and the magic waned. A quick detour to the bathroom left me separated from my worldly friend. But like a plot twist in a Babitz essay, an ambassador’s son reappeared to inform me my friend had gone ahead to the afterparty — and that I was to follow in the second Uber. With no other option and no protest, I followed him to the car. He didn’t get in, citing an early meeting, and I found myself riding with one of the Frenchmen toward a SoHo address. The conversation was dry and enjoyable, like most French vintages, but I was distracted by the growing flurry of texts from my friend:
Where are you
This has been a wild fucking night
Can you call me
At the bar, I am so high
Wait
You’re coming right
Bro where are you
Plz stalk me I am in Uber w. Bunch of French guys
Bunch of French guys. I shudder at the thought.
The ride was short. The SoHo apartment was — of course — a walk-up that looked like the setting of an indie film where no one smiles. I briefly wonder why men with family crests and curated accents live like NYU freshmen. I’ve always found it funny how some men will spend a small fortune on a Rolex but sleep in a bed that touches three walls.
My friend was safe — cross-legged on a crusty leather couch with one of the diplomats’ sons. They’re talking about advertising and existentialism and why New York is dead — you know, the things that feel urgent when you’re drunk and 23. I made my way to the kitchen, poured myself a too-strong drink from a bottle that had clearly been there as long as the building had, and collapsed into a lopsided armchair to observe the last act of the night.
They talked about Proust and compared vacation homes the way you’d compare cuts of steak. I stayed mostly silent. Some nights belong to you, and some nights belong to someone else. It wasn’t fun, per se. But it was something.
That was the night you could have at The Jane. A Something Night. And now, The Jane is gone.
The velvet, the disco ball, the grand staircases — all of it. The place that promised a second Prohibition and delivered a third, fourth, and ninth hangover is closed, swallowed by a richer venture. Sure, there are still clubs in New York. You could follow your favorite DJs from spot to spot and still never hit them all. And I can mourn The Jane for being the ball and ballroom that it was — but clubs open and close every other day. Missing them doesn’t make them special, it just makes you… old.
And there are other options— always other options. If you liked The Jane, go to The Box. If you miss Butterfly Soho, try the bar at Public (not the rooftop — unless The Muses are there). If you’ve finally, thankfully, outgrown Tao or any of its brother-bars, go to Joyface, or Desert 5 Spot. Go to Mulberry, Nubeluz, Chapel Bar, Ray’s, or— or— or— or — the list is endless and ever-changing.
It doesn’t matter where you go, so long as you go. I think I miss The Jane less than I miss the energy I had when it felt like the worst was over. The radical act of getting too drunk and throwing up on the street and making ramen in your parents’ kitchen because, yes, you still live there and you’re damn lucky to be living there.
Maybe that was all we got for our 20s. It wasn’t Gatsby, it was someone else’s afterparty in a fifth-floor walk-up with a wobbly armchair and a man who might own a monkey. I thought we were living through the new party era, but maybe we just caught the last whisper of the old one. Maybe the best we got really was Boom Boom Pow. Maybe the curtain closed while we were still waiting in line. But what a line it was.
