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I've only just noticed this... with Tris39
on the Pub Forum
Image posted by David Walton
Submitted on Thursday, 17th April 2025
With picture contributions to 1471 other pubs
View all this pub's pictures (23 more images)
Detail Pages
The Blue Maid, Borough, SE1
SE1
SE1 1HR
Served areas
Reviews of The Blue Maid (Average Rating: 5½ of 10) see review guidelines
Will Larter left this review about The Blue Maid
There was a tour guide delivering a lecture as I arrived outside this pub. Apparently it gets mentioned in Little Dorrit, so this is a fairly frequent occurrence. The interior of the Blue Maid is thoroughly modern, with plenty of new wood on floors, in the seats and on the bar back. The bar counter is a pleasing wooden top with modern grey paint on the front and sides. A vast array of beer taps includes three hand pumps centrally placed, and the beer list shows that these are all priced at £5 a pint. My half of Five Points Best (NBSS 4) was so good I can't believe it's the same beer that was served to me a few years ago in their brewery tap - obviously it's not the same beer, but it's changed so much from the amateurish, overfresh approximation of a beer from 2018 to what I now think of as the best beer I know of that is brewed in London.
On 25th September 2025
- rating: 7
[User has posted 4491 recommendations about 4122 pubs]
Moby Duck left this review about The Blue Maid
A long single room with a small raised section at the rear accessed via a couple of steps. The decor is basic with a few random prints here and there mounted on the ivory coloured upper walls, the lower walls being modern wood panels. The hard surfaces mean the acoustics are not great. Any downsides are more than tempered by a good beer selection with twenty four craft taps and three hand pulls, on cask were Five Points Best, Howling Hops Small Batch Mild and Burning Sky Plateau, all priced at £5.00, pretty good for London.
A decent pub and may become a frequently visited one.
On 4th June 2025
- rating: 7
[User has posted 2231 recommendations about 2197 pubs]
Tris C left this review about The Blue Maid
Perhaps this pub takes its name from a female pupil from a long defunct Bluecoat school as it seems that this was originally just called the Blue Maid as there are references to the name in the immediate vicinity in the early 18th century, the pub presumably rebuilt in the 19th when it was Eyed-up sometime in or after 1842.
Closed in 2020, the pub reopened last Monday (7th), original name reinstated and with a substantial makeover, the previous reviews no longer apply. It’s part of the same chain as the Earl of Essex (N1), Duke of St. Albans (NW5) and Axe (N16), their trademark being a huge, slatted beer board (see photo), no pump clips or fisheyes allowed. The interior is relatively narrow but goes back a fair way to a raised snug. The floor is new bare boarded, natural wood wainscoting to white walls and Anaglypta ceiling; window reveals to the front are painted a sympathetic navy blue, where you can see a new Blue Maid mirror. The bar back along with said board is modern, the bar front possibly of some vintage. Furniture is dark wood contemporary, tall to a peripheral drinking ledge, décor thin aside from a few trendy prints.
I counted 18 options advertised including a cider – ‘real’ or not unknown – and margarita for those looking to supercharge their blood pressure, fourteen ‘craft’ keg options featuring Verdant Pulp DIPA at 8% then just three cask offerings which I could have predicted from visits to the three pubs mentioned above: Five Points Best, Howling Hops Dark Mild, £2.50 the half and not bad then Burning Sky Plateau, £2.50 a half and a bit green, both served by very friendly bartenders. Customers were few, though of course the place has just reopened, so it was young trendies, then an infuriating trio of jabbering Scandi-noir types at the neighbouring table, behaviour perhaps precipitated by not paying thirty quid a pint like back home, their Swedish meatball routine forcing me to change tables, though either way, the acoustics here are terrible.
Obviously this place is an improvement on the former incarnation and makes for a good addition to the Borough drinking scene, but a short walk to the Hand & Marigold delivered greater rewards. Nevertheless, this pub would make for a good SE1 crawl inclusion along with the above, Simon the Tanner, Market Porter, Lord Palmerston, Gladstone and Royal Oak, but the place desperately needs some sound deadening material. So does the Earl of Essex.
On 15th April 2025
- rating: 6
[User has posted 2283 recommendations about 2232 pubs]
View more reviews of The Blue Maid (10)
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- Official site of Blue Maid - www.thebluemaid.com
- CAMRA WhatPub :: The Blue Maid - whatpub.com
London Bridge, 0.51 miles, 9 min walk (show)
London Cannon Street, 0.76 miles, 14 min walk (show)
Pub Details
Pub details supplied by members of this site to the best of their knowledge. Please check with pub directly before making a special trip.
- Accommodation : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Bar Billiards : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Beer Festivals : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Beer Garden : No - Limited pavement seating. - last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- CAMRA Discount : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Car Park : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Darts : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Function Room : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Hot Food : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Jukebox : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Karaoke : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Live Music : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Live TV Sports : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Micropub : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Pinball : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Pool Table : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Quiz Night : No last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Real Ale : Yes last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- Wheelchair Access : No - WCs downstairs. - last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
- WiFi : Yes last updated 13 April 2025 by Tris C
