The Joiners, SE5

This is a traditional two bar pub in the heart of Camberwell, with a nicely preserved interior. The front bar is a simple public bar-style space with plain floorboards and dark red half panelled walls. A nice curved bar counter stands in the rear right corner with a tongue and groove counter front, some imposing pillars with decorative capitals and a nice etched glass bar back with what appeared to be an integral office space through a centrally positioned doorway. High tables and stools run beneath the front windows with a row of regular tables and chairs directly opposite the bar and down the left-hand wall, which was almost entirely obscured by a huge pull-down screen showing live football – a series of shelves displaying ceramics, old radios and other such items of bric-a-brac remained hidden behind. The rear wall is a pleasant glazed screen with etched glasswork and a collection of whisky boxes lined up along it. However, the room’s stand-out feature has to be the mightily impressive tile painting on the right-hand wall, depicting the coat of arms of the Joiners’ and Ceilers’ Company. Amazingly, the pub’s dartboard used to be hung on this wall, so there are a few chips in the tiles, but they remain no less impressive a sight for it. Passing through a mosaic tile floored passageway, you reach the rear bar which is perhaps slightly larger than the front room and has ample seating throughout, mostly tables and chairs with a few cheap looking canteen style benches of the sort you find in modern day brewery taprooms. The room is painted in darker shades and seemingly receives a lot less natural light but didn’t feel especially gloomy as a result. Other items of note around the room included a retro arcade machine, an upright piano and another TV screen, hung above the servery on the front wall of the room, with a pull-down screen to the left. There were two handpulls in use when I arrived, dispensing Sharps Doom Bar and Brockley IPA. I ordered a pint of the latter from the friendly, but almost impossible to hear through her mask, barmaid. Sadly, the beer was pretty ropey and made a disappointing final pint on my mini-crawl around Camberwell. This pub didn’t really deliver on the beer front and had a much more subdued atmosphere than the other pubs I visited nearby but was still worth a look to check out the tile paintings, etched glasswork and publican’s office – features that are increasingly difficult to find as more and more pubs close across the capital.

A two room pub, front and back, there is some nice decorative tiling on the wall in the front bar, the rest of the pub consists of mostly wood paneling,wood flooring and wooden bar and back-bar, the seating is mostly normal tables and chairs with a couple of high tables in the corners. Apparently real ale is no longer available despite two handpumps and a chalkboard to display cask ales on and coming next, this of course was blank. I settled for a Goose IPA on keg and give the ongoing heatwave the cold beer wasn't an issue.I quite liked it here and it had a decent pub feel, I would call in again but it's location is not a place I'm likely to frequent to often.

The Joiners is situated in Camberwells busy shopping area. Once inside the pub has two seperate rooms,i had a drink in the front room which is square shaped with the bar facing,the seating was quite basic with a few tall tables and chairs to the front and normal tables and chairs elsewhere,the tiled wall looked quite nice. There were no real ales on the bar,so i was left with John Smiths smooth crap to drink,this was a very poor beer. The room to the rear is also square shaped,there was a pool table to the rear and a stage on the left side where the live bands that were advertised no doubt play. I thought this was a fairly basic pub with the only attraction being the live music which was not on during my Saturday dinner visit. Pub visited 13/9/2014