Tower Bridge Arms, Bermondsey, SE1

Dropped in on the back of various bits of hype to see what the fuss was about. Situated near Tower Bridge, this is a two-roomed place that opened in its current guise in 2011. The bar is situated in an opened-out room with bare boards and grey tinged utilitarian paint, though some retro music prints break things up a little. The rear room has an American diner feel with some green leatherette bench seating and is dominated by a large old-style backlit cinema-style sign proclaiming "beer cans and bacon" for some reason. Above the door frame between these two rooms is a red neon beer glass-design strip light. A selling point in the bar area is that on sunny days (as it was on Saturday) the doors can be folded inwards to create a drinking terrace atmosphere. Lots of tables in both rooms were reserved and as seems standard in London half of them were not taken by the supposed occupants despite the scribbled time of arrival having long passed, a practice I find extremely irritating. The increasingly loud music also started to grate. Felt sorry for the girl wafting around who was clearly told to try and get people to order food. In a hipsterish nod there is Ghostbusters wallpaper en route to the bogs. To the bar; four ales, two from Purple Moose plus Sambrook Wandle and Wharfe Bank Verbeia. I tried both the Purple Moose New Zealand and Wharfe Bank; neither were up to much, warm and somewhat lacklustre…similar to those I tried earlier in Simon the Tanner. As is to be expected, there was a good craft keg and bottle range and my companions Camden was a decent drop. Mention elsewhere of a CAMRA discount but I noted no outward proclamation at the bar. As a pub, this place is nowhere near as good as it thinks it is – the Dean Swift round the corner is a much better bet.

Larger than the nearby Dean Swift however seemingly looking to attract a similar customer base, this pub also has an extensive range of keykeg products which included a trio from Camden. Four handpumps at the end of the bar had a couple previously unknown to me, Hewitt's Urbane Gorilla, Cully's Orange Ale plus O'Hanlon's Flagship IPA (£3.50) and Sambrooks Wandle. A large bottled selection in fridges and along the bar gantry. The main room with the bar to one side is bare boarded, has tall tables along the front of the bar and a mixture of benches and pews to the perimeter. The side room resembles an American diner with lurid green benches facing each other across the tables booth style, decor in here consists of large movie and music posters. TVs were showing golf muted while a laid back bluesy soundtrack played. It's all a bit modern and stripped out, apart from the green benches the colour scheme is grey and dark green. Service was friendly and informed and the barman agreed with my deep distrust of the Orange Ale. There is a third room downstairs, the Tower Bridge Tasting Rooms which has it's own bar, this was closed but is available for private hire. Food is served, I didn't see a menu but there were pots of mustard, bottles of Tabasco and salt and pepper sets on each table. A bit quirky and not at all a traditional pub but I quite liked the place.

Semi-modernised rectangular bar plus separate diner up two steps. Full height windows open onto Tower Bridge Road in good weather so can be noisy. Additional downstairs bar does not appear to be in regular use. Background blues music. Three Bath Ales were available: SPA, Barnsey and Gem (£3.70), plus their keg Bounders cider. The fourth handpump offered Dark Star Hophead, and there was also a good selection of continental beers. Overall, seemed quite a reasonable place.