The Marlborough Arms, Bloomsbury, WC1

This is quite a large Greene King pub in a handy location for students from the nearby UCL campus. A corner entrance takes you into a spacious room broken only by a single large pillar pretty much exactly in the middle. Large modern windows run down two sides of the room with rather naff panes proclaiming the pub to be “Purveyors of Quality Cask Ales” and to serve “Famous Fish & Chips”. The room has chunky dark wood floorboards with standard tables and chairs down the left hand side and high tables and stools through the centre. The servery runs in a slightly crooked shape along the right hand wall and boasts a nice dark wood counter and bar back, with the latter sporting some smart etched glass mirrors bearing the pub’s name, although these were sadly partly obscured by various England flags, whilst the flags of the six nations countries could be seen hung from the ceiling. The pub has lots of nice dark wood throughout, most notably on the rear wall, where two large paintings have been set into decorative panels to create a pleasant effect. To the rear right there is a small seating area with more regular tables and chairs and dark wood, plus a lot of small picture frames depicting a variety of seemingly unrelated people. Over to the left, more seating can be found under dark wood panels that have been topped with that rubbish bookcase-wallpaper. Several TV screens were showing a muted sports channel with indie tunes playing throughout the pub. Three Greene King brews – IPA, London Glory and Scrum Down – were outnumbered by a decent guest selection comprising St Austell Tribute, Portobello Chestnut Ale, Sambrooks Junction, Hackney Best Bitter and Wimbledon Phoenix, whilst the keg selection offered a few interesting alternatives as well. The Chestnut Ale set me back a student unfriendly £4.60 and was in pretty good shape, served to me by one of the fairly friendly bar team. I popped in here for a quick pint prior to a gig at the nearby Student Central venue and thought this was a pretty good place for a swift jar, offering a wide selection of mainstream and local ales in a comfortable environment that didn’t seem to suffer too badly from the usual Greene King corporate loss of character.

This is indeed at the better end of the Taylor Walker spectrum as this pub has quite an impressive interior, most notably the painted scenes to the walls. It's a big pub with lots of ornate wood panelling, by-the-numbers TW lanterns above the bar, Wellington lights and a tiled bar apron. However, being a TW pub it has games machines and printed pictorial food menus. There are also multiple TVs showing sport which I can't bear in a pub. The pub was fairly well attended with mainly students and tourists. Ales on: Greene King's Abbot and IPA, Truman's Swift, Taylor Walker's 1730 Special Ale and St. Austell's Spring Fever which for the area was good value at £2.10 a half. It was though far too cold. I'm not a big fan of TW pubs so I doubt I'll return, not least because there are far better pubs across Tottenham Court Road.

As stated below a bit more character in this Taylor Walker pub. 4 real ales and food served.

This pub is named after the coat of arms of the Dukedom of Marlborough, whose family name is Churchill, the most famous member of which would be Sir Winston Churchill. This is now a Taylor Walker branded pub and is thus part of the Punch Pubco managed estate. The usual pub grub menu is available, and the ales on offer were London Pride, Old Golden Hen, Doom Bar and Young’s London Gold. I had the latter which was fine, but at the rather odd price of £1.79 for a half. It looks like a late Victorian pub to me, with the trademark polished granite pillars on the outside. The main entrance takes you into a large high-ceilinged room which is partially bare-boarded and partially carpeted, and with the usual mix of furnishings espoused by this chain. The highlight of this room is the wood panelled back wall with two large (circa 5’ x 4’) prints framed in carved wood, featuring, I am guessing, stylised scenes from the time of John Churchill, the first Duke of Marlborough. The manager kindly showed me the two other rooms – the smaller of which is effectively an adjunct to the main room, but has an attractive fireplace on the back wall. The third room is elegantly furnished and appointed, with some comfortable looking high backed chairs, and normal tables. Although little if anything remains inside from its Victorian past, it still has a lot going for it and struck me as one of the best of all the many pubs that I have visited from this pubco.