Gloucester Casino, London

The Gloucester Casino sits in Kensington, part of a large hotel, and has some on site parking. It has original Grosvenor blue signage, and has a short staircase that drops you down to the reception of this basement location. Very friendly reception team, too.

Once you’re in – normal membership rules apply – it’s a long, thin casino with the slots right there as you enter. The slot offer is very up to date, multi game IGT machines and Novomatic Gaminators to the fore, and plenty of valets should you wish to indulge in an adult beverage or two (unexpectedly reasonably priced) to try to blot out the pointlessness of your life.

Décor is a tidy beige and burgundy for the most part, with table gaming all the way down the centre of the casino and the cash desk and more automated roulette at the far end, with slightly irritating display screens that don’t show the winning number very clearly.  Outside of this, the whole site is pretty tidy, and obviously popular for a wide variety of people – when I visited, a group of about 25 people were learning how to play together, having taken advantage of one of Grosvenor’s party deals.

The only other point of note about this site is that they have inspector’s chairs. I thought these had died out with the Ark, and didn’t spend too much time wondering why when I saw one particularly lazy inspector slumped in his chair, legs akimbo, resting his foot on a roulette table. Some jobs are easier than others …..