Hare & Hounds, Brighton

Visited 11/07/26 The brightly coloured pictorially painted exterior gives way to an open plan interior as described by David below without the heavy pride stuff though some in evidence. Although keg only there is a lot of options with a range to match, stopping for a quick half a Siren Lumina did the job on a warm afternoon.

Visited 24/07/26 No cask. Decent keg offering of Project Babylon Pale Ale from Gun, Siren Lumina, Abyss Superpale, UnBarred Joosy and Casual Pale, Sharps Atlantic Pale Ale, a couple of low ABV - the Siren Soundwave and the Budvar Nealko, Pravha, Blue Moon, Cobra, Caffrey's Premium Ale and Black Stout, Amstel, Guinness, Aspall, Staro. Corner venue in Preston Circus with some picnic bench seating outside at the side. Inside it is bare boarded with an island bar in the centre with a tile skirt. Tall tables with tall, backed stools down the right-hand side and some stools at a couple of the sides of the bar counter. There are some cosy booth tall tables at the rear. There is a banquette to the left of the entrance serving regular tables and some similar tables with small stools between those and the front side of the bar counter. A similar banquette down the left-hand side serving the same type of small tables with a long bench between them and the left-hand side of the bar counter. There is a garden at the rear. No screens and a strong club soundtrack. Venue is heavily decorated ahead of Pride next weekend. Felt quite spacious and vibrant.

This is a very large, open plan pub, positioned in the crook of a prominent junction just a short distance from Brighton station. The place is pretty striking on approach thanks to a large, first storey mural depicting various wild animals for no obvious reason. Inside, things aren’t quite as memorable, thanks to a large, opened out room, bare boarded throughout with an island servery in the centre, which would clearly have once served a number of separate rooms. The bar still has a pleasant dark wood panelled counter with nicely rounded corners, but the years haven’t been kind on the bar back or any former canopy, which are now nowhere to be seen. Banquette seating runs around much of the room’s perimeter with plenty of chairs and low stools in support, whilst the back wall sees the banquettes formed into a row of booths, which look like the best places to grab a seat, despite the lack of natural light back here. The walls have been left with exposed brickwork and are mostly unadorned, although there was a huge pull-down screen to one side showing a live football fixture, with quite loud music in place of the commentary. An open kitchen to the rear left was dishing out a few mediocre looking meals and whilst there were quite a few customers knocking about on my Saturday afternoon visit, the place still felt flat and empty due to the expansive interior. There were three handpulls on the bar, two of which were off, including a turned Sharps Doom Bar clip, leaving Gun Pale Ale as the sole cask option. A surly barman poured me a pretty mediocre pint of this, which I didn’t enjoy all that much. This felt like a bit of a student-friendly pub that might work well in the evening when there’s a bit of a crowd in but was a pretty average experience in the middle of the day. There are a few nice decorative features dotted around the place, but on the whole, I felt it was a bit empty and uninspired and I’d probably drop it if I was crawling around the area North of the station again.