Randomness Guide to London

Hello there, sorry for the delay. Kake tells me what's in the charts this week and it always then gets lost in the depthless mess that is currently my inbox. So this week's featured article is...



... the Ship and Shovell, WC2N 5PH, a charming and slightly hidden little pub, one of the few remaining outposts for Hall & Woodhouse (aka Badger) beers in the capital, as yet unsullied by any word of "craft" or the like. Just a row of handpulls dispensing classic and well-kept English bitters and pales (or "boring brown ales", though I don't mean that as any disrespect: I love the BBB). The pub is rather more interesting for its unusual twin-site arrangement, taking up buildings on both sides of the little alleyway. The north has the main bar, the south has the "Crow's Nest" upstairs.

Our one new article this week is for Garden Community Cafe, a community-focused greasy spoon by Prince Regent DLR out there past Canning Town.

Two reported permanent closures are The Old White Bear in Hampstead (which we felt had gone downhill since it was Ye Olde White Bear and was a proper real ale pub), and The Clifton in St John's Wood, one of very few pubs in the area and a delightful little getaway, so it's particularly sad to see this one go.

Finally, two more impending pub closures. There's The Star, also in St John's Wood because clearly nobody is drinking there anymore, or (more likely) property is worth more as residences. And then there's The Sekforde Arms in Clerkenwell, which your correspondent only visited for the first time a couple of years ago, and what a delightful unpretentious boozer it is, serving tip top Young's beers, and now sadly looking like it'll become a restaurant after only 185 years of sterling service to drinkers.

But at least there's a couple of reopenings, both following refurbishments, and both out in Twickenham: The Prince Blucher and The Eel Pie.

This week's featured article is Pollock's Toy Museum, a museum of toys set in a couple of adjoining terraced houses in Fitzrovia, just off Tottenham Court Road.

We have one new addition: Browns of Brockley, a cafe and coffee bar in an area of London you can probably guess.

The entry for Loving Hut, a vegan Chinese restaurant in Edgware, has been updated.

The reported permanent closures are two pubs and two bars: The Brewery Tap in Wimbledon and The Glassy Junction in Southall; Jrink in Soho, and 1802 in Docklands.