The Castle, Harrow

A very fine 3* CAMRA listed heritage pub,tied to Fullers and close to Harrow School in the steeply hilly area off the High Street.Original featues abound,fine doors,etched glass and a nesting of small rooms around a central bar.There is a halg height wooden divider between two sections which requires ducking down,the furniture is traditional and the nooks and crannies pleasing.There is a small restaurant at the rear with tables laid for servive. The full line up of handpumps are in the section reached by the side door next to the exterior bench seating in a small courtyard and on my trip the offering was London Pride,ESB,Hophead (NBSS 4,£5.55) and American Pale Ale a decent line up of Fullers ales.The pub sits in an upmarket area and this is reflected in the customer mix.It's dog friendly and no doubt staff from the school us it,not sure if pupils are allowed in ,although the bar staff did seem to be of similar age. A well run ,friendly pub with heritage features making the climb up the hill worthwhile.I would most certainly return.

This is a nice Fullers pub close to Harrow School, situated on a fairly steep hill just off the High Street. You enter via a corner door into a small front Public Bar with smart floorboards, pastel shaded walls and a short, curved section of servery to the rear. This room has some very limited high table and stool seating plus one bench to the left of the entrance, but was primarily being used as a room for greeting and registering customers before seating them elsewhere around the pub. The room’s, and perhaps the pub’s, most distinctive feature is a very nice part-glazed partitioning wall next to the bar, which has a very low doorway connecting it to the rear bar, although sadly the pub’s current one-way system meant that this doorway was out of use. A doorway to the right, with a hatch next to it, takes you through to a quite homely seating area with the same flooring, a few basic tables and chairs around the perimeter, dated floral wallpaper on the upper half of the walls and an unusual inlaid pattern across the lower half. A tidy fireplace stands on the end wall underneath a copper hood and plain mirror, whilst the walls have been covered with all sorts of old clocks, including a rather hefty looking grandfather clock, none of which were showing the correct time. Both of these rooms have modern etched glass windows with Fullers branding. Moving through to the rear from here, you enter a dark tile floored room with a few tub chairs around another fireplace giving it a lounge feel and then from here you can complete the circuit by entering the rear bar which is decorated in similar fashion to the front bar but is a bit larger and has its own fireplace. There is also a decent looking garden to the rear which extends under some cover down the left side of the building, although I didn’t manage to get a proper look around it, nor did I find the old billiards room, which may or may not still be available for the public to sit in. The public bar had two ales clipped – Fullers London Pride and Gales Seafarers – although I suspect a couple more were available from the rear bar, as I could see the backs of four handpulls without being able to figure out what was on them. I tried a pint of their London Pride which has to go down as the best pint of Pride I’ve had in years – there’s some excellent cellarmanship clearly going on here. This is a really nice, multiple room pub that I didn’t enjoy as much as I might have thanks to the restrictions on being able to freely move around. It has an interesting interior that carefully balances traditional features with the need to modernise and with beer in as good shape as my pint of Pride was, there are plenty of reasons to mark this place down for repeat visits.

Official site of the Castle - castle-harrow.co.uk

Official site of the Castle - castle-harrow.co.uk

A CAMRA inventory heritage pub, the interior of which is well described by other posters – suffice to say it’s worth a visit on that basis alone. Perched up a fairly steep hill, it has a quite dominating position within the context of the area. My companion and I were impressed and the surroundings were complimented by some excellent Fullers beer – Pride, Discovery, ESB, HSB and the seasonal Hare. We tried one of each and they all came out well. Prices were OK given the location and Fuller’s irritating habit of fleecing their regular punters. Talking of punters, there were a right mix in here, excluding the wake taking place in the back room. Apparently there is an impressive garden at the rear but we didn’t try finding it. The atmosphere was lively when we were there and that was achieved without the aid of music or TV, which shows it can be done. We enjoyed it here (stayed for an extra hour and knackered up the rest of our crawl as a consequence). It’s well-worth seeking out.

This is a classic Fuller’s pub, which had on Gales HSB, London Pride, and ESB. The Pride was absolutely superb, and provided a reminder of what an excellent ale this can still be when kept and served properly. And at £3.25 a pint it is very reasonably price in a pub that has gastro aspirations, as this one appears to have. The pretentious menu pricing still remains – sandwiches are 5½, the Castle Burger is 8¾, etc, etc. I just don’t see how it helps anyone, not least any foreign tourists who may pitch up here, not to use the widely recognised pricing convention of £5.50 and £8.75 respectively. Having had my gripe, I have to say that I think that this is an excellent pub. It is well described below, so I don’t need to repeat it. I sat in the room to the right of the bar counter as you enter, and this is the one with numerous antique clocks on one of the walls, and amazingly two of them were telling the correct time. The rest of the walls were covered with miscellaneous prints. There was no music being played, no fruit or games machines, although I did spot a ciggy machine. This is a classic Victorian pub that is rightly on the CAMRA inventory of heritage pubs, tucked away down a side street adjacent to the world famous Harrow School. Like The Flask at Highgate and The Holly Bush at Hampstead, it has managed to combine an upmarket ambience while at the same time retaining the feel of a real pub. This is rightly a destination pub.

Randomness Guide to London - Castle entry

Randomness Guide to London - Castle entry