The London strip pub scene

RIP the White Horse 1978 - 2016.

At least the Flying Scotsman has survived as a pub, even if dramatically different to the kind of pub it used to be.

how many Strip pubs are left in London exactly?

(26-06-2017 13:42 )harry corrado Wrote:  I remember the 'Shakespeare Drank Here" sign from the first time I visited

I always thought that was tongue in cheek, as the building was a warehouse before it became a pub in 1978. Could there possibly have been a pub there in Shakespeare's time? However, the Curtain Theatre where Shakespeare worked for many years was situated just over the road from where the White Horse was in Shoreditch High St, so I'm sure that Shakespeare did drink somewhere in that vicinity, even if not at that specific address.

Hi,
Last night I was talking about the old pubs in the East End side of the City and a friend mentioned two that were exceptional but did not last.
The first one was a bar at the back of City Road in the 1980s, this was the height of the aerobic boom and the girls were in leotards and lycra. Service was great and the prices just a bit above pub prices.
The second was again in the 1980s and was in the basement of a former warehouse of off City Road, this was open for a few months and was in effect an unlicensed pub with strippers. This pub’s main feature was the girls, in the days before the Eastern European girls the person running it had Irish girls plus a large number of students. Every Friday was a stag night till it was closed. We all were wondering what happened to the guy who ran it and if he was still connected with this side of the business

(28-06-2017 18:34 )babelover48 Wrote:  how many Strip pubs are left in London exactly?

I would say that over the years there must have been 300 pubs in London that could be classed as strip pubs. Nowadays even being optimistic I would be surprised if there were as many as 20.

Could do with a few of these strip pubs up in Yorkshire!

(29-06-2017 12:51 )marlowe Wrote:  I always thought that was tongue in cheek, as the building was a warehouse before it became a pub in 1978. Could there possibly have been a pub there in Shakespeare's time?

There was an inn there and Shakespeare was said to frequent it. So the 'Shakespeare Drank Here' sign was meant seriously.

(30-06-2017 15:00 )elgar1uk Wrote:  I would be surprised if there were as many as 20.

You won't be surprised then, I'm sad to say. In central London there are now only 6 or 7 strip pubs, depending on whether you still count the Metropolis as a pub. If you regard London as meaning the whole of Greater London it still only makes the total 10 at the most.

(27-07-2017 14:31 )trevor format Wrote:  

(30-06-2017 15:00 )elgar1uk Wrote:  I would be surprised if there were as many as 20.

You won't be surprised then, I'm sad to say. In central London there are now only 6 or 7 strip pubs, depending on whether you still count the Metropolis as a pub. If you regard London as meaning the whole of Greater London it still only makes the total 10 at the most.

That is amazing. When I lived on the Hackney Road in the eighties there were at least five on that road alone or just off it. The ones I remember are Martins/Metropolis, Limes (or Slimes as we waggishly knew it), The Axe, Browns (never went in it) and Solly's - some right dodgy geezers in that last one.
My favourite pub was The Marksman - no exotic dancers but they sold a lovely drop of Adnams bitter.

Dan Volatile Wrote:  That is amazing. When I lived on the Hackney Road in the eighties there were at least five on that road alone or just off it. The ones I remember are Martins/Metropolis, Limes (or Slimes as we waggishly knew it), The Axe, Browns (never went in it) and Solly's - some right dodgy geezers in that last one.

In that area there was also The Spiral Staircase, Big Ron who ran The Black Lapdancers events used to take it over twice a month, anyone remember Housewife Sue, Tanya and her hubby Malcolm and only for a short while an amazing German girl from Nuremburg called Olga
Those were happy days
Back to Solly's One of the regulars was called Peter in the 90s he inherited his mothers apartment near Camberwell and turned it into a photographic studio for a couple of years.
Peter sadly died around 2006 he would have been at least 86 , I saw him about a month before he went and he was still able to come up to the West End on his own. Really a great person and sadly missed