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Detail Pages
The Clifton, St John's Wood, NW8
NW8
NW8 0JT
Reviews (Current Rating Average: 3½ of 10) see review guidelines
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Rex Rattus left this review about The Clifton
This place is unchanged since the previous reviewer's visit. it doesn't look much like a pub, considering that the only signage is the understated pub sign. I'm just sorry that I failed to visit it before the putative developer got his grubby hands on it. It's comfortable enough in a modern characterless sort of way. Probably the best place to sit is in the conservatory at the back, where of course you can enjoy a lot of natural light. It's just a shame that this has become such an ordinary pub considering its delightful backstreet location in a leafy St John's Wood avenue.
It did have a couple of real ales on though - West Coast IPA, and Windsor & Eton Guardsman. I doubt whether I will go out of my way to visit this one again.
On 7th January 2019
- rating: 4
[User has posted 2606 recommendations about 2520 pubs]
Please Note: This review is over a year old.
Tris C left this review about The Clifton
Situated in a rather lovely quiet St. John's Wood backstreet, just off the world-famous Abbey Road, is the newly-reopened Clifton.
Closed in 2013 and faced with redevelopment, it has been saved, though apparently the entirely new interior, which doesn't take a single cue from the former incarnation, is the result of the putative developer ripping out the original interior in preparation for conversion. As a result, the pub has been completely reordered with a side bar running down the right side, the original island bar, traditional pub décor and real fire having disappeared entirely - you'd be hard pressed to imagine that this was recently a traditional Victorian pub. Even the entrance door, which was on the right side, has been bricked up, entry being effected from the side alley. As such, you enter into something that cannot immediately be identified as a pub, rather it looks like a dark and gloomy restaurant/canteen. The floors are dark modern herringbone parquet, the bar has a wood front and pale wood top and the ceiling is painted white. Thereafter, the walls and bar front are painted a shade of slate grey, which only contributes to the gloom. Furniture is very conventional, looking as if it came from a canteen, with circular white marble tables to the pub's front window; the dumb waiter faces directly onto the drinking area, looking industrial and ugly - there isn't even any décor by way of a distraction. To the rear is a conservatory, slightly lower than the pub's main floor, and muted music played.
A very friendly barmaid was serving up Watling Street's Golden Ale and Dark Star's Partridge at - for the area - an astonishingly low £4.00 a pint and pleasant enough.
Whoever is at fault here, this is what in effect resembles a gloomy modern restaurant with a bit of ale, and frankly is no longer worth the effort. Like the rest of the pubs in NW8.
EDITED: 21st November 2013.
A second visit to this dinky pub located down an attractive residential street off Abbey Road.
A multi-room pub with a small central bar with gantry, real coal fire, some traditional décor and beer garden/patio to both front and rear. Live sport was playing on a couple of TVs thankfully with the sound down, but despite this I've deducted a point for sport being shown at all. Service was friendly and efficient and clients were in general mixed. This is definitely the best pub in NW8 (though this isn't hard) and I would certainly come here again if passing.
On 13th June 2017
- rating: 3
[User has posted 1985 recommendations about 1951 pubs]