At first glance, it looks like an abandoned building.
But this dishevelled former pub is actually home to a large swingers club - where revellers enjoy fetish parties, orgies and spanking.
Stepping into the basement of the unassuming venue, you'll find a full-blown sex dungeon - complete with a stretching table and jail cells.
There is also a 'puppy cage' for customers to use, as well as a padded room, which can be isolated to leave revellers in the darkness.
Upstairs, you'll find sex swings, spanking benches and themed rooms, such as a 'medical room' with tools, the Liverpool Echo reports.
And you'll also discover a Medieval-style rotating ‘fetters wheel’.
The shabby-looking building, named Townhouse, is situated between a Greek restaurant and a railway bridge in Merseyside, where the 'swinging scene' is a lot bigger than you might imagine.
"At least" one private party takes place every week while up to 130 people turn up at Townhouse on a swinging night.
And at the centre of this scene are Vicky and Jim, a married couple in their 40s or 50s who run the popular Wirral venue. They took on the business six years ago after first visiting the club as customers.
When they meet the Echo, they are smartly dressed and affable. After making a coffee, they sit down at the bar in the club, admitting they are slightly apprehensive about letting the newspaper into their world.
The couple, who don't look like they make a living hosting sex parties in a fetish dungeon, aren’t secretive about what they do.
They have put their names to the business - albeit, their first names only - and are incredibly open and approachable.
It took a lot of negotiation and reassurance to convince them to let the Echo inside - they are used to seeing the swinging lifestyle grossly misrepresented in the press as being the preserve of ageing perverts.
Many of their close friends and family don’t even know what they do.
As Jim puts it: “Some people know, some people don’t.
"For those who do know there’s no problem.
“We aren’t doing anything wrong, we have taken a business on and made it a good one and a safe place for people to go.
"People don’t see that. They just see it as seedy.”
On a quiet Tuesday afternoon, outside of regular trading hours, they showed Echo reporter Emilia Bona around the club’s myriad rooms.
In doing so, they offered her a glimpse inside a hidden world of partner swapping, fantasy fulfilment and fetish play.
Below, Emilia describes her visit to Townhouse...
Just a short turning off New Chester Road sits a former pub that from the outside looks shabby and dishevelled.
This is entirely deliberate. To the passing public, Townhouse looks like nothing more than a disused building.
It’s a discrete frontage they are keen to preserve, given the nature of the business and the desire of members to maintain their privacy.
Arriving at Townhouse I knocked on a metal side door and was greeted by Vicky. She’s confident, personable and obviously very switched on.
Vicky shows me into the downstairs bar area, where every swinging social gets started. She explains to me that it all begins downstairs - and that any action goes on in the rest of the building.
“The ground floor is sociable because there are single girls who come here and don’t want to play," says Vicky.
"They would have had the conversation downstairs first.
“Some people don’t come here to swing, they come here to watch. Three quarters who play want someone to spectate [on].
"People think it’s always about swapping partners but it’s anything from being an exhibitionist yourself - so having sex in front of people - to girls playing, which is the most common, to a bit of soft play, to full swapping.
"Anything from playing to watching to full-blown gang bangs.”
Jim, who sits next to me and mainly leaves it up to Vicky to lead the conversation, interjects: “It’s very multi-faceted.
"I hate the concept but 50 Shades of Grey comes into it. It’s not black and white, it’s different shades in between.”
On a swinging night, the club can hold up to 130 people - and regularly hits capacity as people flock from far and wide to fulfil their sexual fantasies.
Around three quarters of those coming along to a regular swinging night would be partaking - but there’s no pressure to get involved, and many members come to socialise.
“Our main nights are Thursday, Friday and Saturday," Vicky says.
"We open some Tuesday nights for a fetish social or the odd club night on a Tuesday. Wednesday we’re open for private hire - BDSM play, LGBT members come in or a safe place for a drink."
“Friday, Raw, is a pure play party. It’s hard play from the offset.
"They don’t want to socialise, they just want to get down to it - it’s mainly singles.”
The demographic at Townhouse is mainly singles and couples - they have a limit on the number of single guys who can turn up on a Saturday night so it’s not crowded with men.
Some of Townhouse's clientele are cheaters - a label Vicky divides into two different camps.
She says: “We have different types of members in that category. Some guys and girls with partners who know - that’s called cuckolding.
“People have partners at home who don’t know but what happens in Townhouse stays in Townhouse. If people decide to do it, it’s up to them. People might confide in us after a while.
“It can be a loveless marriage with a sexless life. About 15% of our members are cheaters. Others are loving couples or singles.
"People choose to stay single because they love the scene.”
The membership at Townhouse, which currently stands at a staggering 22,000, is fairly reflective of the 'swinging scene' as a whole.
With the average age standing at 24-45, the club has members who are 18 and members who are 70.
The owners are keen to dispel the myths around ‘the kind of people’ who partake in the swinging lifestyle - insisting it’s very different to the general perception, or the picture that gets painted in the media.
Vicky said: “People seem to think it’s seedy, filthy, naughty but what we’ve got with our membership is the clients are professionals.
"We get solicitors, teachers, police, healthcare professionals.
“It’s people who do look nice and make a good first impression - it’s nice people you can have a good night with and people who respect each other and their private lives.”
Vicky and Jim tell me they have been open since getting together and shared their desire to visit a club with each other early on in their relationship.
However, despite visiting Townhouse themselves before owning it, they tell me they can no longer get involved in any swinging at the club.
In Vicky’s words, ‘if you worked in Greggs, the last thing you’d want to do is go home and eat a cake.’
Other members have met through the club and gone on to get married and have children.
Running a four-storey sex club is no mean feat - and Vicky and Jim say they’ve had to jump through ‘rings of fire’ to make sure everything that happens inside is above board.
Townhouse is fully legal and licensed. They’re known to public health and licensed as a sexual entertainment venue which can operate at unsociable hours and show adult material on their screens.
They even have STI testing in-house.
When alcohol, partner swapping and fetish play are involved, consent can become a concern - and the owners are very vocal about the steps taken to ensure every member feels safe and comfortable.
Vicky said: “It’s very rare people just turn up on the day.
"We have got great spidey senses so if we think their ideas are removed from reality and we think they’re not stable and are going to disrespect the rules they get kicked out.”
She added: “The club scene is not the private party scene where there’s an expectation to play. It’s up to you what you do here. It’s like going to a gym.”
Jim explained some of the measures taken to make sure alcohol doesn’t come into play when influencing people’s judgement in the club.
He said: “It’s the same with alcohol. It can blur the lines. We make sure people who turn up aren’t drunk.”
When Vicky and Jim started coming to Townhouse it was only about swinging, but they expanded the club’s offering to provide other activiites.
The couple are very proud of their fetish facilities - boasting that there’s nothing like them outside London.
And there's certainly a lot.
The basement of the club is a full-blown sex dungeon, complete with a stretching table, ‘puppy cage’ and jail cells. There is even a padded room which can be isolated to leave customers in the pitch black.
Upstairs the club is fitted out with sex swings, spanking benches and a rotating ‘fetters wheel’ that looks more like a Medieval torture tool than a piece of kit for couples to use.
There are themed rooms - including a ‘medical room’ with a dentist’s chair and tools for role playing. Across the hall, a leather winch system hangs ready to hoist customers into the air.
Showing me round the club, it’s obvious Vicky takes immense pride in their facilities and in the adults-only pleasure palace she and Jim have built ready to satisfy the needs of customers.
Vicky says: “There’s no other clubs.
"The next nearest one is Manchester because the local council will not allow it. We are the only one in the whole of Merseyside.”
For many people who enjoy the swinging lifestyle, Townhouse is a one-stop shop for all the sexual fantasies - but it’s not for everyone.
While I was at the club, Vicky repeated their unofficial mantra to me repeatedly - ‘what happens at Townhouse stays in Townhouse’.
Members are promised complete privacy and confidentiality and the owners clearly care about making sure everyone who comes to them feels at ease and protected.
This isn’t just important for the swingers who frequent the club - Vicky and Jim have worked to turn Townhouse into a ‘safe space’ for Merseyside’s LGBT community.
Vicky said: “We get a lot of lesbians and bisexuals and also trans girls who want somewhere to come where they won’t get any stick.
"Our members don’t even look - even when the girls spend hours on their outfits.”
All the members understand the importance of the confidentiality surrounding the club, with Vicky saying: “Everyone respects the rules that what happens here stays here and sometimes you hear stories of people who see each other in Tesco, but they give a nod and that’s it.”
However, despite the privacy afforded to members, some people just can’t face the idea of walking into a swingers club and bumping into someone they know.
That’s where Merseyside’s private sex party scene comes into play.
Swingers who are involved in the scene estimate there are private parties going on across the city ‘every week’, with people booking out luxury venues or even opening up their own homes to a select few.
The penthouses, apartments and hotels rented out for private sex parties often aren’t aware their facilities are being used for orgies, with groups fearing they would be refused access or blacklisted if they knew what was really going on.
Vicky said: “For those who don’t want to go to clubs or the scene there are options. It’s privacy and confidentiality - they are scared of seeing people they know. It’s the embarrassment of seeing your boss, a family friend or even a relative.
“I would say in Liverpool you’ve got one a week. At least one a week if not more. That could be small scale - one couple inviting three others or on a much bigger scale.”
Couples or singles wanting to attend the private parties can find each other on dedicated swinging sites, where people view and vet each other’s profiles, hand-picking the select group they want to spend the night with.
From four-storey sex clubs to private parties, Merseyside’s 'swinging scene' is alive and well.
Despite existing under the radar, to people in the know, the scene is bigger, bolder and further reaching than ever before.
Old myths of pampas grass or windchimes outside your house being a tell-tale sign of the swingers next door are entirely unfounded.
You could drive past it every day and never know what goes on inside - but Townhouse proves the region’s swinging scene is alive and kicking.