When? November 5, 2021

Where? Dragon-i

Who? Gilbert Yeung, Arthur Bray, Eric Fok, Bonnae Gokson, Cindy Yeung, Peter Cheung, Jeanine Hsu, Kay Li, Edwin Chuang, Andrew Bull, Sylvio Wang, Marina Bullivant, Allan Zeman, Amanda Strang, Karim El-Azar, Kevin Poon, Drafus Chow

Here’s what you missed: Legends of Hong Kong nightlife gathered at Dragon-i on November 5 celebrate the iconic venue and unstoppable rise of its founder, Gilbert Yeung, as part of Tatler’s Pass the Aux event series. The inimitable entertainment mogul was interviewed onstage by Yeti Out founder and DJ Arthur Bray in a talk hosted by Sean Fitzpatrick, Tatler’s regional managing director of dining and events and commercial general manager.

“This is a set of faces who are more likely to see each other at 4am, not 4pm,” quipped Fitzpatrick, as guests including Allan Zeman, Jason Swamy, Amanda Strang, Bonnae Gokson and Kevin Poon settled into their booths.

It was a session of discovery as Yeung opened the door to his world, illustrating audacious anecdotes with star-studded photos and footage from the club’s founding in 2002 to the present day alongside insights to his life as a former British boarding school child who developed his taste for house music working at a record store while at university in Toronto, entered the club scene in New York, and after returning to the city in the late Nineties, formed a production company to inject some life into Hong Kong’s ailing club landscape. 

A Q&A session closed the talk before Andrew Bull, aka DJ El Toro, in exceptionally ebullient form on his birthday, was surprised by a pyrotechnics-laden bottle (it was Guy Fawkes’ night, after all) of Dom Pérignon as the room sang, cheered and toasted to his health. Once the stage had cleared, the lights went down and the music went up as guests rocketed into their weekends from a venue that has always been at the heart of the action.