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Submitted on Monday, 2^nd September 2024
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The Spurstowe Arms, E8

68 Greenwood Road
E8
E8 1AB

Correct details

Served areas

Hackney, London Fields, Dalston

Reviews of The Spurstowe Arms (Average Rating: 6 of 10) Add Review see review guidelines

Moby Duck left this review about The Spurstowe Arms

A Victorian built corner pub that is now very much a gastropub with no cask beer available leaving an offering of standard keg and corporate craft, still much as described by Tris and seemingly popular with a certain set but not a place I could warm to.

On 2^nd September 2024 - rating: 5
[User has posted 2151 recommendations about 2118 pubs]

Please Note: This review is over a year old.

Tris C left this review about The Spurstowe Arms

This is a mid-Victorian pub, seemingly originally built for the Wenlock Brewery, situated a few minutes’ walk from hipster central: Broadway Market.
The interior is broadly J-shaped and holds few surprises given the location. The walls are black to the dado, white to the picture rail, thereon up black to the black ceiling; for once it looks quite good, even with three surprisingly neat ceiling fans, not the awful industrial ones looking like they’ve been half-inched from the set of Tenko. The rear has doors with leaded lights combining frosted panes and either red or green stained glass, so perhaps the place was run by Fuller, Smith & Turner; beyond is a decent beer garden. There are three fireplaces, one with a wood burning stove. Lighting comes from several metal shaded hanging lamps above the attractive bar, a few sconce lights fitted predictably with filament bulbs and wax encrusted bottles containing candles on the tables, the whole resulting in a pub that’s bordering on being a little dark. Furniture generally comprises conventional wooden tables, old school chairs and some pews; the floor is boarded. The large vase on the bar was still in place from Rex’s review, filled with dried flowers.
Décor comes in the form of a few wall mounted pairs of antlers, framed prints and paintings in ornate gilded frames. There are also plenty of large, framed mirrors, some ornate, part silvered, part painted and a few with silvering that has failed, giving a distressed look.
Customers seemed to be mainly trustafarian or of hipster persuasion; unsurprisingly Portishead’s Dummy played over the gramophone; there was no sign of the topless man in a black bra.
Sadly there’s now no real ale, a solitary unclipped pump hiding behind said vase. The so-called ‘craft’ selection was limited; I spotted Neck Oil. Otherwise, there’s Moretti so I opted for a decently poured Guinness at a thoroughly indecent £5.70.
This is quite a nice place and far better than expected, but the lack of real ale means a lower score by at least two points. There’s no shortage of real ale breweries in Hackney, so why not use them?

On 17^th August 2021 - rating: 5
[User has posted 2209 recommendations about 2166 pubs]

Please Note: This review is over a year old.

Alan Winfield left this review about The Spurstowe Arms

The Spurstowe Arms is a back street corner pub that is a short walk from Hackney Central station.
Once inside there is a decent sized single U shaped room with the bar facing,the room is bare boarded and the seating is a mix of bench seating and pew seats and a few normal tables and chairs.
There was one real ale on the which was Sambrooks Wandle,this was a decent drink.
There were menus on all tables so i think it is more of a dining pub,but none in on my Saturday dinner visit.
I thought this was a decent enough pub to have a drink in.

Pub visited 11/6/2016

On 30^th July 2016 - rating: 7
[User has posted 6113 recommendations about 6113 pubs]

View more reviews of The Spurstowe Arms (4)

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