Your Local Pub

I'm also minutes away from renowned bastion of the spit and sawdust boozer The Boston Arms. Not a place you can drink in too often and retain a positive outlook on life, but the day it becomes a trendy gastropub is the day I leave the country.

There's also Artifex Wine Bar near me, which seems like it has really awesome music but the number of arrests I see happening right in front of it on an almost daily basis kind of puts me off :/

xp ha. i used to live 2 mins from the boston until recently, but was slightly afraid of it: i'm sure you see more people go in than ever leave. i miss how good tufnell park/kentish town is for pubs now i'm in finsbury park.

I've been permitted to leave the Boston many times, it is possible. There are definitely certain times when it's the only pub that'll hit the spot.

Five years ago I would've called the Pineapple my favourite pub in the area, but it's turned oddly soulless since it changed hands.

http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/22/2213/Shakespeare/Stoke_Newington

I play (badly) for the cricket team.

I like the Shakespeare.

if you go to uncle lou's
you'll get black gunk on your shoes
everyone smokes
you'll probably choke
but they got that rhythm and blues

actual nearest pub is this:

http://img01.beerintheevening.com/95/9555b2dad5aa8f53ebb66dca454f58b0.jpg

it's okay, would be great in any other area but the quality of pubs is strong around me. too many families for my liking and poor music frequently. plus feels a bit funereal imo. not great ales for what seems like a good ale pub either, bland weak english stuff.

http://img01.beerintheevening.com/8c/8cdb1b72f23c5629033768306f1a35d1.jpg

this is better, good music and always lively, nice inside too. been here absolutely loads since moving over to london and how much time me and my friends spend there has that nice running joke feel you get from a good local. downsides are it has a gang of crony cocaine selling dudes who have really inane loud conversations and can take over the place on occasion, plus it can get v crowded.

http://img01.beerintheevening.com/13/13ea38457d76229f41f72e66ce3c28b1.jpg

sometimes feel this is my favourite, though i live like 3 mins from the two above and this is a little further away. beautiful building, nice atmosphere, friendly landlord and they'll serve you till all hours. good bunch of old codgers playing live jazz on fridays and saturdays too. nice in summer being beside the canal. never had a bad night there and being served till 1am on a friday is about perfect, one of the few things i miss about ireland is the later pub opening hours.

http://img01.beerintheevening.com/7f/7f95c83c88602c252bb6e2e4cd62a433.jpg

like this place for a late drink, it's not amazing but prob has the most interesting ales of any of the pubs listed. friendliest staff too. it's a bit pokey but nice lighting, a decent option.

I've been going to the Camel a fair bit after life drawing classes on thursday. The ales are ok! And some decent European lagers if that's yer bag. Very small and usually full though. The Approach is our alternative haunt.

downsides are it has a gang of crony cocaine selling dudes who have really inane loud conversations

last time i was there three of us were at the small table in their little area by the gents and it became pretty difficult to hear each other. good PIZZA tho.

Ronan is that third one the palm tree? That is my favourite pub in London I think, dismal & stunted palm crucial to appeal imo.

Looks like the Palm Tree to me. I've only been there once but it made quite an impression on me. It seems like it occupies its own little world.

Is the second one the Florist? I quite like it there.

yep second is the florist, worth a try ledge if you've not been in that yet. esp midweek, when it's quiet there's nowhere better. i do like the approach too tho tend to think it as more of a place to eat.

third is indeed palm tree. apparently it's only called that due to the fact that it used to be part of a street called palm street. assume the tree was added later.

no love for The Approach ronan?

i do like it...nice food, but i find the ceiling too high for drinking in there, i don't know why that matters but it doesn't feel compact enough or something. but that's a quibble really, again if it was the only pub on the street i'd be there all the time, it is a great pub too.

haha that's true - there is something about high ceilinged pubs. they should be called beer halls or something.

i like high ceilinged pubs - one of the things i always want in a pub is space. preferably personal space.

the old man pub is the worst kind of pub, obviously.

I like old man pubs. Time and a place for every type of boozer.

Hip crowded basement bars in Shoreditch/Dalston are generally way worse.

old man pubs = creepy old men staring at you, occasionally trying to talk to you and being generally inhibiting presences. and NO DECENT WINE.

why you'd go to a dalston basement bar to just drink is beyond me - only go to those places to dance.

Time and a place for every type of boozer.

except walkabouts etc, all bar ones etc, dodgy estate pubs (no problem with friendly estate pubs), awful omnipresent "club with no dancefloor" type bars...

really wish we had decent 'pubs' here

Love the Florist - recently been wishing it was my local

Also like the Camel - maybe more so in summer because of the outside

Still never been the Palm Tree

shoreditch generally is so shit for pubs. it really bothers me when i'm in that area. i guess owl and the pussycat does the job and is nice still post-refurb but most of the others are so disappointing.

Has anyone been to The Victory on vyner st?

People in E2 are spoilt for choice:/

old man pubs = creepy old men staring at you, occasionally trying to talk to you and being generally inhibiting presences. and NO DECENT WINE.

― lextasy refix (lex pretend), Wednesday, January 26, 2011 5:10 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

The first point isn't true for all of them by any means. The second may be, but I don't drink wine in pubs.

I haven't been in the Owl & Pussycat post-refurb. I felt betrayed and disappointed they'd refurbished it at all. Otherwise the Reliance is the only good pub in Shoreditch proper, but that doesn't really feel like anyone could call it a local.

The best pubs are the ones that welcome old men and The Kids (as opposed to actual kids) equally.

i think we tend to default to the red lion or the strongroom or the barley mow when in sditch. both are fine. i mean, you'd never ever go to sditch for a "quiet drink" would you? all you need pubs there for is pre-club drinking.

The first point isn't true for all of them by any means. The second may be, but I don't drink wine in pubs.

i'm basically just trying to discourage anyone from trying to make me go to the wenlock again

That may not be an issue for much longer :(

The Prince Arthur on Brunswick Place is a nice cosy place, feels more trad than Hoxtonised.

the red lion never has any place to sit down. owl and pussycat always felt too loud, too crowded, i.e. a bar that looks like a pub.

florist fans really would like the kenton i feel

ou'd never ever go to sditch for a "quiet drink" would you? all you need pubs there for is pre-club drinking.

glad i don't live in shoreditch tbh

This is my nearest pub according to FancyAPint.co.uk:

The Victoria
http://www.fancyapint.com/pubs/pub2258.php

Never been in it. The only local pub I've been to is v slightly further away:

Ye Olde Rose & Crown
http://www.fancyapint.com/pubs/pub2257.php

'salright, has a theatre above it, so it gets suddenly busy at interval and then quiet again a few minutes later. Don't really go drinking in pubs around where I live though, because if I am in the pub it's usually with people who don't live near me.

Closest pub to me is a recently refurbished old man pub with big tellies for the football. I never go in because it's a hun shop (rangers pub).

idk what's going on with the wenlock now, sale appara fell through but they're still looking to sell. last time i was in there before xmas a man wearing a morrissey t-shirt complimented me for looking like morrissey. obv i look nothing like morrissey. great pub.

havent visited the new owl&p either but have been told it's vile tedious gastro. (would assume they took the billiards out as well :/).

was in the florist on sunday for a bit, s'ok but i tend to think of it and the camel as bars tbh. otoh 1) they do london pale ale and 2) they do it in proper jars so fair play.

only been in the palm tree the one time years ago but it seemed fun. iirc the guvnor was doing his nut at someone for ordering water haha.

im so envious of all the real pubs. we've got nothing but college bars and shitty pub rip-offs.

this is my hangout.
http://armsbyabbey.com/

really miss proper pubs & pub sunday lunches now I'm in the US. Have a decent "Tavern" nearby that plays BBC america, has pool tables and a bit of a beer garden; has baseball stuff and photos of baseball stuff all around but it's pretty ok actually. But gooduns are kind of few and far between, particularly when you're used to having about 8 proper pubs within a 10-min walk.

absolutely would kill for a beer garden around here. never going to happen.

im so envious of all the real pubs. we've got nothing but college bars and shitty pub rip-offs.

― Cultivating a manly musk puts your opponents on notice (chrisv2010), Wednesday, January 26, 2011 1:14 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

yeah

i'm envious too. i like the names

i'm sure there are exceptions but anything called a "pub" in the US can be safely avoided

uh huh.

around here they call things pubs just because they have guiness on tap.

i guess we have dive bars, do those exist in england

i work at a dive bar, buts its a great dive bar. we actually have a bar in town called the dive bar....which used to be a complete shithole when i was 21. now its pretty darn good, owned by same folks as armsby above.

http://thedivebarworcester.com/

dive bars exist in England, yes. In London, they often seem to be Spanish-themed, for some reason.