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Jen Vuk Writer September 30, 2025 — 3.30pm

As a woman, you don’t expect many favours from a men-only club, but that’s exactly what the Melbourne Savage Club delivered – albeit accidentally – when its “Karen”-bemoaning email was leaked recently.

For anyone unfamiliar with this charming local anomaly, the signature club opened in 1894 and took its moniker from the Savage Club of London (named after 18th-century English poet Richard Savage). It describes itself as the “home of bohemian Melbourne” and motivated by “music, art, drama, literature and science”.

The email in question (“Karen” was the members’ charming shorthand for women like me) proposed ceasing – post-haste – a six-month trial allowing women to lunch at the 131-year-old establish

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