The Garrick Club is a gentlemen's club in the heart of London founded in 1831. It is one of the oldest members' clubs in the world and since its inception has catered to members such as Charles Kean, Henry Irving, Herbert Beerbohm Tree, Arthur Sullivan, Laurence Olivier, Raymond Raikes, Stephen Fry and John Gielgud. From the literary world came writers such as Charles Dickens, H. G. Wells, J. M. Barrie, A. A. Milne, and Kingsley Amis. The visual arts have been represented by painters such as John Everett Millais, Lord Leighton and Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
In 1956 the rights to A. A. Milne's Pooh books were left to four beneficiaries: his family, the Royal Literary Fund, Westminster School and the Garrick Club.
As of 2016, the club has around 1,400 members (with a seven-year waiting list) including many actors and men of letters in the United Kingdom.[1] New candidates must be proposed by an existing member before election in a secret ballot, the original assurance of the committee being “that it would be better that ten unobjectionable men should be excluded than one terrible bore should be admitted”.
The Garrick Club is also home to major collections of art, with more than 1,000 paintings, drawings and sculptures on display. It also houses a theatrical library.