The Exmouth Arms, EC1

Exmouth Market has certainly become much more hip and trendy since the last time I was here and the Exmouth Arms is no exception. It's now a fairly trendy place. albeit reasonably quiet during the daytime. The pub occupies a prominent position on a street corner and the exterior is quite impressive. The open-plan room inside is much more minimalist, but still makes for a nice drinking environment. With only one other customer present, staff seemed to outnumber customers by at least 2 to 1. 3 real ales were on - Burning Sky Plateau, Buxton Blonde & Northern Monk Eternal. In addition, there was a good selection of craft beers on tap and in bottles.

Very pretty ex-courage house - with all green external tiling. Good Beer Guide 2020 entry and unusually for the area, late opening on weekends until after midnight. This of course meant it was a bit loud for my tastes - all pumping music for the late night crowd.

Attractive ex-Courage pub with dark-green external tiling and a semi-traditional, partly opened-out interior. Although on a corner, and with large windows on two sides, it was already getting gloomy inside during my late afternoon visit. However, all four handpumps were in use - dispensing Castle Rock's Hat-trick, Slippery When Wet from Revolution, Thornbridge Astryd and Henry Smith Best Bitter (£4.50) - so hardly cheap, but not a bad selection of cask ales. The dozen keg taps also offer some interesting craft beers too.

A very traditional looking pub in the heart of Exmouth Market, it occupies a good sized corner plot and is clad with green glazed tiling on the exterior. A number of picnic benches were outside, and this was a popular spot on our recent Sunday evening visit. Internally it’s all one single, open plan room with dark wooden boards on the floor and dark green wood panelling on the lower part of the walls. At least, I think it was dark green, but it was so gloomy in there it was difficult to tell for sure. Large windows on two sides with stained glass around the top must let in plenty of light during the day time, but it really did seem remarkably dark of an evening. If it were a cosy old pub that not something I’d normally complain about, but the noisy and vibrant atmosphere somehow seemed rather at odds with the light levels. There was some exposed brick walling to the left, and a number of unusual black and white drawings of mythical creatures. Booth style seating was along one side, with regular round tables and chairs elsewhere. Despite four pumps on the bar, only two were in use dispensing Navigator and Mercy from Great Heck. Perhaps they’d had a busy weekend, I’m not sure if that’s normally the case. Not a bad pub overall, but perhaps a bit more lively and noisy than the sort of thing that I’d normally go for.

Impressive looking pub with an interesting choice of ales. Well worth a visit.