Let The Drink Talk

[alehead]

Raise a glass to city pub's interior

DAVID BALE
24 October 2005 11:44

The number of pubs in the Norwich area may be on the decline but two watering holes have managed to feature prominently in a new guide to the best pub interiors in the region.

The Gatehouse in Dereham Road, Norwich, which has an intact 1930s interior, is singled out as one of the jewels in the crown in the region.

And the Red Lion in Kenninghall, south of Norwich, was praised for its ability to take you back to a quieter age to get a glimpse of what a country pub was like before the First World War.

Alarmingly, however, The Campaign for Real Ale's new guide to pub interiors of special historic interest highlights that only 90 of East Anglia's 6,000 pubs have interiors of special historic interest. That's the conclusion of a major new survey by CAMRA members in the region.

Fans of the Gatehouse will not be surprised to see it included in the new book. John Gates, who has been the licensee for eight years, said one of the main features was that the pub was entirely wood paneled, with no wallpaper, and there were also wooden beams

He said: "The pub was rebuilt in the 1930s and has stayed the same since then.

"There's a lovely window in the front which has bits of stained glass in it and looks like the window from an abbey. It's great to be featured in the new book."

Red Lion landlady Mandy Berry, who has run the pub with husband Bruce for about nine years, was also pleased to be in the book. She said: "We are very much a real ale pub. My husband originally came in to do the building work, and we kept it as very much an old style pub with a modern twist.

"We have open fires and a snug room, which conjures up the image of old boys sitting around drinking with their clay popes. We have worked out that ale has been served here since 1722."

Apart from these two though the guide found that precious few pubs had interiors with much heritage value.

The guide blames decades of modernising, themeing, opening out and conversion to trendy cafés or gastropubs.

Paul Ainsworth, Editor of the Inventory, said: "It's frightening how much we have lost. This new guide is a wake-up call to bring attention to the problem and help people seek out those pubs which do still have significant, genuinely old work inside."

He said CAMRA was calling on brewers, pub-owning companies and local planning authorities to recognise how rare authentic historic pub interiors were and to see and use them as cultural and commercial assets.

The guide is published at a time when renewed concerns for the future of Norwich pubs have been made following the end of the Little John pub in Norwich. The Little John stood on the site at Armes Street since 1854 but last week became the latest pub to lose the fight to housing developers.

The city once boasted a pub for every day of the year but now it has fewer than 150.

In the past 10 years more than 30 city pubs have closed. Many have been lost to residential redevelopment and the Little John has been earmarked for nine two-bedroomed flats.

The demolition of the Earl of Leicester also aroused huge opposition from campaigners who claimed the city council should have done more to protect the Victorian building.The CAMRA Regional Inventory for East Anglia is available on line www.camra.org.uk or from the Campaign for Real Ale, 230 Hatfield Road, St Albans AL1 4LW by post or, for credit card sales, by telephone 01727 867201, price £3.50 plus £1 for p&p.


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