You might know Lupo’s as a chic Italian restaurant nestled next to what remains of the New Picture House (rest in peace), serving delicious food and even better cocktails. But what fewer denizens of St Andrews have discovered is that it’s quickly becoming the hottest new spot for events—socials, nights out, afterparties, and more.
I caught new manager Lucas Taylor, on a day off, where he explained how Lupo’s has transformed itself and why he’s so excited for the upcoming Full Moon Party on the 26th of October.
What can you tell us about the Full Moon Party?
As a student myself, I was here for Halloween last year, and just felt there wasn’t a lot going on in the town. After being promoted to manager over the summer, I’ve now worked with so many people doing so many events I thought it was time to organize one myself. With Lupo’s as the ‘it’ venue lately and Halloween as my favourite holiday, I wanted to go all out.
Because I’m the manager, we have fewer restrictions on our setup than events normally do: for example, I can open the back room because I’m personally willing to spend all day carrying the tables out to the kitchen. This is the first event at Lupo's where we’ll have two bars open, because as manager I can offer the staff incentives to work overtime—one of them will be in a room with a DJ, while the other will be next to live music.
I can exclusively reveal that it’ll be Jazzworks performing, and the DJ will be one of the ones from Throwbacks, who’ll be creating a brand new Halloween-themed playlist. We also want to try and make the event more interactive, so we’ll be adding some games and a shot bar to the back; plus we’ll finally have a cloakroom, which is a feature loads of people have been asking for.
I’m not sparing any expense because I just love Halloween so much. I would happily lose money on this event—it’s easily the highest spend ever on a party at Lupo's—but sales have been much higher than I expected and we’re on track to sell out. I’ve enjoyed organising this so much that I’d love to make it a recurring event—we’ll be selling tickets for a bonfire event at the Full Moon Party, and further down the line I’d love to do a Christmas and New Year’s party.
Lupo's has burst onto the event scene this year. What led to this change?
Lupo's has been open for four years, but we officially started hosting events last year. Prior to the last freshers’ week the managers were older, more traditional people who weren’t a fan of events. But last October, our manager left and the restaurant owner passed the responsibility onto four fourth years. They did a few events, but nothing huge—but I was made manager at the start of summer and I love events.
I’ve definitely been ramping it up—it’s helped that I have good relationships with various fashion show committees, so I can use them to help spread the word. As it stands, we’re popular—I’m getting three emails a day requesting event bookings!
As we expand, we want to remain a friendly venue for students who are just starting out hosting events: for example, we don’t mind if they don’t quite meet a minimum spend. We offer organizers a lot of flexibility to make their night unique: we have lots of plugs, so we can put the DJ deck anywhere.
Our worst nightmare is an event being ‘just another night at Lupo's'—everything should be different. For example, at the DTF event the other night we suggested switching the DJ setup and the lounge: people loved the changeup. I love the variety too—it’s boring working behind the bar for what always feels like the same event.
Source: Lupo's.
Have you encountered any surprises when throwing events?
Not me particularly—but we want our guests to be surprised! We’re including fun, interactive surprises in the backroom, and are always thinking about different ways to draw people in. That’s not always easy—big events have a lot of moving parts, and we always have to ensure we’re safe AND fun.
However, there are more surprises in the works: I’d recommend people follow our event Instagram, @fullmoonpartyatlupos. Every time we host a new event the handle will change but the page will remain. It’s the best place to keep an eye on things.
What about the far future? What else can we expect from Lupo's?
Lots of different things! In a few months, we’ll be having kitchen renovations that will close the restaurant for a week or two—the space will be used solely for events for that time.
Just after this interview I have a meeting with People You Know Productions who are considering putting on a play here: it’s so cool to see how people imagine new ways to interact with our space. We’re also committed to spreading the word about us to various student groups; we’re happy to help people take initiative and try different things without making them jump through as many hoops as other venues in town do.
I’ve seen so many amazing things being done with this place that’s exposed me to so many things I would never otherwise have considered: for example, we’ve got a Diwali event coming up, which is something I’ve never seen before. It’s this creativity that makes hosting events so exciting, and makes me so excited to continue working in this space.
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