Commercial Tavern, Shoreditch, E1

lovely exterior with open plan room inside, though follows the curve around to the right. Looks like they have gone for a Ruin style, very scruffy but with various fittings like animal skulls around. The beer is a bit warm. Interesting

A wonderful curved corner building. Sadly the inside has been Nathan Barleyed to the max - to say it's scruffy and unkempt would be doing it a disservice as it's obviously a curated dump, done in a style that's like somewhere from the 1940s halfway through a strip out after bomb damage. Internally there's the main bar with a filthy stripped wood floor, crudely stripped walls and some plaster board drilled into one corner of the ceiling (one would assume to disguise a hole but in here, who knows). There's a spur room off right where the wood panelling has been painted the same colour that Linda Blair in The Exorcist threw up over the priest. On the positive side is plenty of beer, 10 keg and 4 cask as well as a big menu if bottles. Cask line up from Anspach & Hobday, Harbour Snake Eyes and Hawkshead. I plumped for a half of the Hawkshead Red which tasted pretty weird, certainly not the usual Hawkshead quality (NBSS 1.5). There was a distinct herbal smell in the air, hopefully from outside rather than upstairs. Overall? Swerve it, unless you are Swampy.