Ignition Brewery Taproom, Sydenham, SE26

Good little bar on the ground floor of a block.Very busy as they had a Jazz session on my visit.Four beers on 3 from Ignition and one from Coalition.Very good they were.Just realised reading Pubsignmans review that they were probably keg beers while i thought they were cask.Well supported by the locals.

This is a very smartly presented brewery and taproom in the heart of Sydenham that eschews the usual railway arch/industrial estate format in favour of a well-appointed shop conversion-style bar set apart from the actual brewery. You enter to a roughly square-shaped room with modern floorboards, whitewashed walls and a surprisingly high ceiling. The servery is at the back of the room and has a very basic counter and white tile bar back with a couple of shelves above used to display vases, photos, brewery branded mugs and other such odds and ends, all beneath a large brewery logo. Seating is nice and varied, with long benches down both side walls, tables and chairs through the centre of the room and a plush sofa under the very large front windows. The wall to the left is covered with a very impressive Tom Fry mural depicting a slightly abstract group of pub revellers doing whatever it is that pub revellers do, whilst on the opposite wall, there’s a large neon sign bearing the brewery name, along with some branded T-shirts that were for sale. There was a good mid-week early evening crowd in when I visited and a reasonable contemporary soundtrack chugged away in the background, occasionally drowned out by the chatter of the customers. Four Ignition brews were available on keg dispense according to the blackboard next to the bar, and various bottled options were visible in the fridges as well. The options on this visit were Jump Start, GTI Turbo, Milestone and South of the River, with the Jump Start clocking in at £4.80 for a very pleasant, hoppy brew. The brewery looks to employ staff with various learning disabilities, and they all play hands on rolls from brewing the beer to serving behind the bar. Service was very friendly, and the owner took some time to have a chat with me about the brewery and their plans to start making their own ice cream in the summer. I was really impressed with this operation, which I thought offered tasty beer straight from the brewery in a much more comfortable environment than the vast majority of their peers seem to manage. The only real problem I have with the place is its limited opening hours, which have scuppered a few attempts to visit the place in the past, and the lack of cask ale. This is a great addition to Sydenham’s pub scene though and somewhere I’ll most definitely look to return to the next time I get the chance.

Official site of Ignition Brewery Taproom - ignition.beer

Official site of Ignition Brewery Taproom - ignition.beer