Dear Readers,
Good afternoon, and welcome to a special edition of Capital Letter, in which we present the 25 best pubs in London. Exhibitions, films, plays and chi-chi restaurants can wait for a fortnight.
Now, it’s a mercurial time for the capital’s boozehounds, as fascination with wet-led pubs has boomed: the Sunday Times even now have a beer correspondent! Well, as long-time readers know, we have a pints correspondent, Jimmy McIntosh, and no one knows more about the capital’s grogholes than he does.
So, in conjunction with the TikTok superstar, we present our list – not in order, of course, because that would be inelegant. Let’s head first to just inside the M25.
The Bell, KT20
While London might be best known for its buzzy city boozers, its outskirts do a pretty good trade in The Country Pub. Yes, even London’s badger baiters and tax dodgers need somewhere to get squiffy, and while places like The Sportsman in Mogador or The King & Tinker in Bulls Cross possess stunning mises en scène to knock back six pints of Ruddles after a long yomp in, only one can take the top spot (or at least have a place on this list) – and it’s The Bell in Walton-on-the-Hill. Located at the end of a meandering woodland path, The Bell’s got it all: an ethereal garden, a roaring fire, and a massive overflow car park for Surrey’s middle-aged drink drivers.
The Cow, W2
This Notting Hill mothership is beloved by super-star celebrities, Bedalian troubadours, Swedish private equity barons, Celine-toting SheBu yummy mummies and washed-up male models. Owned by a Conran scion, specialising in Guinness and oysters and rammed at nearly all hours of the day, it may not sound like your thing, but this is the capital’s sceniest pub: darkly glamorous, scattily iconic and irresistible on a blanched summer afternoon. If those toilets could talk!
The Ship, W1
‘Lammo’s Ship’ as it’s known, owing to its popularity with Steve Lamacq, the pencil-thin Radio 6 DJ, has been praised in this newsletter before for its luxuriant burgundy interior and nautical fittings. It’s shrouded in a deep rouge glow, which sort of gives it the feel of a particularly high-class Parisian brothel. Still, somehow, not that busy – which may in part be explained by the £7 pint cost and garish daubed adverts in the window. Still: the best winter pub in central London.
The Barley Mow, W1
Marylebone’s Barley Mow (Marylebarley Mow?) has a unique and strange rule: you can sit outside and drink, but woe betide you if you stand outside and drink. It’s a faintly idiotic bit of council led beer-ocracy that would usually turn us off, but the Barley Mow is so good it kind of doesn’t matter.
Pokey in all the right ways, including its original Georgian drinking booths, the Barley Mowlebone has a semi-pro pub league darts board in the back, an elevated selection of normal beers and even some drinkable wine – if you can believe that.
Chequers, SW1
It is very easy to broadcast that Chequers is an excellent pub, and that everyone should lend them their custom, as it is completely and utterly unruinable, given the vastness of its seasonal real estate. Every summer, drinkers take over the great expanse of Mason’s Yard, treating the St James’s piazza as some great tarmac beer garden. Populated with an agreeably entitled crowd of oil traders, art world toffs and London Library layabouts. Come winter, and the pub’s cosy cerulean interior means it’s harder to get a spot – but if you do, you’ll never want to leave.
Lord Clyde, SE1
The people who drink at the Lord Clyde actually like beer. It was there that we watched a man piss himself through sheer inebriation before the clock struck noon on a weekday. That’s someone who likes beer. The Lord Clyde claims its reason for fame is its presence on the shortest street in London (Clenham Street – the circumcised tip of a once much longer road, which now only contains the Lord Clyde’s generously described ‘beer garden’). Actually it is because it is the best place to go in London if you want to get really, really drunk.
Dog and Bell, SE8
One of the more obvious nominations on this list, yes, but it’s such a pleasure to see this Deptford boozer threaten to become an institution. Frequented by piss artists and actual student artists alike, it’s a wonderful winter pub, namely because their baroque Christmas lights blaze well into January, and very possibly February. They also do an excellent pint of the thinking man’s stout: Murphy’s. Stick your toucan up your arse.
Shakespeare’s Head, EC1
A flat-roof paradise, this Zone 1 pub is beloved by thespians, ingénues, and post-work postmen alike, being as it is the nearest proper boozer to both Saddler’s Wells and the Mount Pleasant sorting office. The jukebox is free, the landlord is lovely – add that to its zen-like beer garden and the Old London sandwich counter, and you’ve got one of the finest establishments to get soused in the inner ring of the capital.
The Black Deer, IG10
What do you mean you’ve never been to Debden? The suburban New East End represents a strange, idealised slice of what life was supposedly like in London 60 years ago: the pie and mash shops, the seafood stands, the 2.4 children – and the pubs. The Black Deer, located in the middle of a maze of rolling 1950s housing stock and looking like the clubhouse of a provincial golf club, is the Essex borderlands boozer par excellence. Inside, it’s the platonic ideal of a Proper Pub: the deep vermillion carpet, the wall-lining banquette, the raucous and inviting atmosphere that keeps you coming back. At just 50 minutes from Liverpool Street, there really is no excuse to not head out east and find pint nirvana. Go on, you’d go if Vittles told you to.
The Cock Tavern, NW1
Local for TF office favourite, Hugh Corcoran, this Hibernian hoochhole is in the heart of Somers Town, in between King’s Cross and St Pancras. Populated by the RMT union workers and the odd CMS student, this Hibernian hoochhole really is as good as Zone 1 pinting gets. Two pool tables at the back and Celtic insignia everywhere – this is their pub when they come down to London.
The Hare, E2
A classic East End boozer on the Bethnal Green Road, replete with a Cockney barmaid. The Hare is the sort of place that chubby American tourists reckon to exist on every street corner in London. Not just a nostalgia trip, though, this place is run tightly by long-serving landlord Julian. A fantastic smoking area for gasping locals of all generations. Plus, given its location at the end of the infamous ‘Libertines alley’, your chance of running into an ageing Spanish tourist in a Jack Daniels t-shirt and winklepickers is 47% higher than any other area of London.
The Orange Tree, N21
The Little Green Dragon might win the CAMRA awards, but the real heads know that Winchmore Hill’s premier pub is The Orange Tree, a delightful boozer situated in the suburban sprawl of N21.
They do Guinness particularly well here which, for those of you who’ve recently made the black stuff your entire personality, is a real treat. There’s darts, there’s quizzes, there’s a generous back garden – all you need to do now is convince some mates to come all the way to Winchmore Hill with you.
The Park Tavern, KT2
You might think Kingston-upon-Thames is the most anodyne, drab, monotonous satellite town in all of the land. And you’d be right. But what the home of Declan Rice, emos, and provincial clubbing does have is plenty of pubs, and while most of them are nothing to get giddy for, there’s one little place at the foot of Richmond Park that really is something special. Step into The Park Tavern and you’re immediately drawn to the ceiling covered in beer mats and tankards, and walls adorned with boozy curios. This is a proper suburban beer drinkers pub, a bit like The Masons Arms in Teddington or The Swan in Bushey. What sets The Park apart is its sun-trapped oasis out back. A must for anyone who finds themselves with an hour to kill in the land of the Saxon kings.
Sir Robert Peel, NW5
NW5 has lots of mid-tier pubs that people reckon to be brilliant: The Southampton and The Pineapple chief among them. The best boozer in the postcode is the Peel though: a wonderful Friday night and Saturday afternoon pub, fizzing with possibility. There’s nothing better than walking out of Chalk Farm station, angling down Queen’s Crescent and into the Peel, not knowing what will transpire. The editor’s favourite pub in London, for those of you who care for such information.
City Barge, W4
Skip down Chiswick Mall and round the bend for one of the most romantic pints you can possibly have, as the waves of the Thames splash onto the pavement outside this pub on Strand-on-the-Green. Dating back to the 14th century, the Barge manages to accomplish that all-too-rare feat: serving up pub grub without being a dreadful place to drink. And if the tide rises and you end up stranded here, all the better. Fall head over heels with a bar back. Have a frisson in the bogs. Truly one for the lovers among you.
Admiral Vernon, RM10
You can tell a lot about a pub by its Google Maps images. The Admiral Vernon’s in Dagenham is full of people having a good time, from the West Ham fans guzzling Carling to the strange abundance of hairy rock bands sporting Ibanez guitars. It’s a proper place for the community to go, of the kind that is increasingly dying out on the edges of the capital. Barking & Dagenham boozing has taken a battering over the years, with two out of three pubs in the borough closing since 2001. For now the Vernon clings on in the face of modernity – a mock Tudor boozer that, with its cash-only policy and distrust of food offerings, mercifully refuses to get with the times.
Joiners Arms, SE25
The most southerly pub in a London postcode, The Joiners Arms lies in Woodside, an area that’ll soon be renowned for being where the middle classes priced out of Crystal Palace (priced out of Peckham) settle. So get there early and reserve a seat at the bar, because it’s a real gem of a groghole. It’s a bric-a-brac paradise, with more tat on its dimly lit walls than an Esher car boot sale. But there’s a genuine warmth there: part low-beamed country pub, part inner city Old London boozer, The Joiners is rocking most nights of the week thanks to its… ‘tuneful’ karaoke nights.
The Olde Apple Tree, SE15
We hesitated to include this backstreet Peckham pub – partly because it’s become a buzzy in a similar vein to the Berwick Street Blue Posts or the Army & Navy, and partly because our Pints Correspondent is almost certainly barred – but the The Olde Apple Tree ticks all the boxes of a proper boozer: wet-led, a fading glamour, and a hidden Copenhagenesque outdoor area that pushes the smoking ban technicalities to their limit. The days when a pub would be chocker from noon till midnight are sadly long gone, and the Olde Apple Tree is an interesting canary down the mineshaft of operating a booze-only establishment in an era of gastros and people drinking less. It might be perennially under threat of demolition, but for now, this majestic beast trundles on as a new generation appreciates its beauty.
The Cockpit, EC4
The list of genuine, bona fide world-class pubs in the City of London isn’t a long one. The Bell on Bush Lane is pretty good. The Blackfriars, yes, beautiful. The Windsor by Fenchurch Street has a certain Old London charm to it. The one clear winner is The Cockpit, located opposite Shakespeare’s old gaff off Queen Victoria Street.
Getting its name from the bloodsport that once took place on site, these days the only cocks in here are the gileted city boys who pop in three times a week for their post-work cinq à sept. Nevertheless, it remains a sensational boozer: carpeted, cosy, and with cheaper pints than most City establishments.
The Prince Edward, N7
The Prince Edward has a claim for being the best boozer in the whole of London. It boasts the capital’s finest interiors. It’s frequented by locals, and as such has locals’ prices. It’s the kind of intimate, two-bar pub you can spend entire celestial afternoons in slowly slipping into a warm pint fuzz. So maybe it’s easier to write about what’s not good about the pub. It doesn’t have heaters in its smoking area (although when the flags are cracking, its beer garden is a delicious sun trap). Its toilets aren’t anything to write home about. And now, thanks to its high placing on London’s Only Newsletter, it’s about to be frequented by the kind of people who read The Fence. Ah, well. It was fun while it lasted.
The Britannia, EC1
The area either side of City Road is great. Part post-industrial penthouses, part 1960s housing developments, it’s a beautiful, sleepy, gently throbbing part of the capital that feels very much its own little world. The Britannia is the area’s champion boozer. It’s rare to find a pub this good this close to central London, but it’s all there: the wood panelling, the cheap grog, the absurdly friendly landlord. It’s also probably the only pub in London with a lifesize cut out of Dublin’s finest cistern inspector, Conor McGregor – but maybe best not to think about that.
The King’s Head, N4
The pubs surrounding the Emirates are undoubtedly the best of any football team in London (with Millwall second, and Tottenham third). We love The King’s Head the most, that bolthole of bacchanalia located on a corner of Blackstock Road. Come for the cheap pints, live sport, and accommodating bar staff, stay for the regular chaotic karaoke sessions that go deep into the night.
Eleanor Arms, E3
The long-serving landlord of the Eleanor Arms, Frankie Colclough, recently retired after nearly 17 years serving Stella to sloshed East Enders, which makes its inclusion in this list slightly risky business. But, provided the pub stays virtually exactly as it was – the easy, old school charm; the plentiful selection of beer and crisps; the tricky pub quiz – the Eleanor will remain a must-visit if you ever find yourself out in the wilds of Bow.
The Shanakee, W5
The train station pub is a beautifully transient place. There can’t be many in London that anyone other than time-killing commuters actually use. But out west in Ealing lies The Shanakee, a boisterous booze box opposite the station frequented by both W5’s Irish community and its professional party drinkers. Looking out over Haven Green, in the summer the windows are thrown wide open and the sounds of the GAA and Dirty Old Town come drifting out into demiurbia. But this isn’t just a misty-eyed tribute to the Emerald Isle: ostensibly The Shanakee shuts at midnight on weekends, but we’ve known the revelry to continue into the early hours when the occasion takes it.
Turner’s Old Star, E1
Imagine the Queen Vic from Eastenders (when it was good, like the Dirty Den, Barbara Windsor and Pat’s naked boyfriend with the novelty bow-tie era) made flesh. The interior, exterior, and, crucially, prices of Turner’s Old Star are eminently Victorian.
The vibe of the pub is so traditional East End that they filmed camp murder classic Legend here, in which Tom Hardy played both of the Krays. Unlike a lot of places that give this vibe, the Old Star is the real deal. A proper local’s pub with cheap beer, pies under a glass dome wearing their little mould toupees and baleful sense of lost content.
The Crown, N19
Holloway Road has at least six decent pubs on it – more, probably, than any other street in the capital – and The Crown is the pick of the bunch, a back-to-basics boozer which still serves pints for under a fiver. There’s a pool table and all-pervading sense of deep calm. Spending a Sunday afternoon here as sobriety slowly slips away from you and your cronies is like climbing back into the womb. If the womb had half-time analysis from Micah Richards and Jamie Carragher.
So there we have it, a totally uncontroversial listing that we’re sure won’t have our inbox hopping with anger and acrimony. Share it if you like it, share it more if you hate it, too.
We’ll rejoin you next fortnight with a conventional Capital Letter, and we’ve already got some very exciting things planned. If you enjoyed this outing, please consider become a paid subscriber, it will warm the very cockles of our hearts. Until the next time.
All the best,
TF