Papillon, 61 Commercial Road, Southampton SO15 1GG. (Blog last updated from visit of 22.11.2025.)
What a place. Papillion is smart and inside an old church, opposite Southampton’s Mayflower Theatre, and more to the point The Mayflower Village pub….handy when waiting for the doors to open on a rainy night.
It’s a few hundred yards up right from the railway station when you exit on the opposite side to the port. If arriving by car, there are some handy on-street spaces between the venue and the station, if you get there early enough.
It’s all standing , bar some fixed seating down front left and dotted round including upstairs, but out of view of the stage. Capacity is 450.
If you get a space on the rail around the part of the balcony above the stage, there is a good view. I have been quite happy upstairs when the support band is on – sitting out of view and occasionally wandering about. There’s a bar upstairs at the back as well – variable stocks and a fabulous stained glass window backdrop.
When I visited to see Spear of Destiny I grabbed a spot on the bench seats at the front left, saving legs for when the band appeared.
For The Clause, (blog link) it was a sell-out and hence very busy, but it was still possible to move about and access the long downstairs bar. Ideally, to see well, you want to be in the main circular part of the downstairs – there are a few pillars – but I was comfortable further back for the Clause, avoiding the exuberant youths having a good night.
Yup – this is a lovely spot. Not a routine gig venue but more something a bit special. A place to look forward to visiting.
Gigs with Ivan 