The Racketeer, Kings Cross, WC1

Recently reopened, renamed and marketed as 'An independent, neighbourhood cocktail bar in King's Cross. Relaxed elegance in an intimate setting, outside seating and a tiny walled secret garden.' This part of King's Cross has yet to be - and perhaps never will be - gentrified. This was a down-at-heel locals' boozer but no longer. Most of the Taylor Walker regalia has been retained, but with plain glass panes to the TW lanterns. Inside, the bar is now central, metal-topped and minus the pot shelf. Gone too is the awful sticky-back brick skeuomorph plastic. The games machine has also been consigned to the skip, but happily the wonderful mirrors, glazed wall tiles and floor tiles, probably encaustic, are on display to fine effect; the remaining floor is bare boarded. Furniture is conventional with green leather(ette) banquettes to the perimeter. Lighting is as muted as the music. The old Taylor Walker panes are displayed by the stairs. Descending to the loos one is presented with some rather bizarre partly candlelit catacombs, like something out of an Edgar Allan Poe novel. All that was missing was the Pentagram of Baphomet, and a blonde haired young woman tied to an alter, with a cloaked, dagger-wielding Charles Gray looming over her. Back to reality and ales - none. Four chrome, unlabelled founts dispensing Purity's Lawless Lager, Veltin's Pilsner, Siren's White Tips IPA and Purity's Long Horn IPA, all priced between £4.80 and £5.95 a pint! This is Kings Cross not Kensington. The Racketeer has the potential to be a good pub; some real ales would get the mark up to at least a 5. That and a soupçon of human sacrifice.

Official site of The Racketeer - www.theracketeer.co.uk

Official site of The Racketeer - www.theracketeer.co.uk

Although I could not see any signage I think The Carpenters Arms is now The Racketeer