National Inventory Pub Crawling: Manchester

Having arranged to stay with friends in Oldham (the weekend of the Gloucester versus Sale Sharks match in Stockport in April 2006), we took the opportunity to sample some of the listed Manchester pubs.

You can traverse the entire Greater Manchester region with a one-day travelcard at £6.50 (buses, trams, trolleybuses and trains). For the lovers of urban and industrial architecture amongst you this is a godsend; mainly due to the slow and almost stationary speeds at which things tended to move. Take some friends and play "spot the landmark", a fun game for all the family.

Our first stop was the Hare and Hounds, conveniently situated just over the road from the Shudehill Metrolink station. Walking in past the TV screen halfway through the Grand National will not endear you to the locals (ask how we now know). This Grade II-listed 1930s pub is in both the National Inventory and the Good Beer Guide, and it is an odd shape, with a diagonal wall separating off the front room from the main bar. We were astonished, nay, delighted even, to be charged only £3.10 for two pints of Joseph Holts Bitter (4.0%), although our delight at the price was somewhat tempered by a disappointment at the flavour. This was not a reflection on the cellarmanship; the beer was in perfectly good condition but I just don't consider it a very flavoursome beer (and all three colleagues agreed). Still, we enjoyed a wander round as we supped, particularly admiring the internal windows and a glass ceiling panel in the back room.

The next port of call was the Marble Arch Inn, just 4 minutes walk up the road, probably my favourite of all the pubs we visited on this trip. It is also Grade II-listed, and appears in the appendix to the National Inventory on the strength of its main drinking hall. There's a strange modern truckers'-syle cafe off to one side, but it's the main hall that's impressive - a big oblong no-frills high-ceilinged room with a magnificent ornately lettered frieze around the top of the room. Apparently legend has it that one is supposed to drink one's way around the frieze, which consists of a series of names of drinks. We didn't try that, but we did our best to sample the ten beers that were available on handpump, including several from the pub's own microbrewery. The prices were quite reasonable: our first round cost £4.25 for a pint of Manchester Bitter (4.2%) and a pint of Ginger Marble (4.25%), both from the Marble Brewery. The Ginger Marble was my beer of the weekend and really does taste of ginger! After the first two beers we started trading halves with a couple of friends to enable us to sample the entire range of ales whilst ordering our meals. I seemed to have stopped tracking the prices and indeed the individual beers at this juncture. Some were more palatable than others to my taste, but all were in excellent condition. The food was absolutely superb - and the portions were quite generous for the price.

As we had now decided to only visit the "central" pubs, we retraced our steps for the 200 yards to the Beer House, which isn't on the National Inventory but is listed as a free house in the GBG. There were nine beers available on handpump plus several other handpumps out of commission. Here we paid £7.10 for two pints and two halves; I had a very drinkable pint of MoorHouse Black Cat Mild.

As a gentle stroll seemed quicker than the trams, we headed to Portland Street to try and find the Circus Tavern (as our Mancunian friends had never noticed it!). We almost failed to spot the Grade II-listed pub as it looked shut, but a rap on the door produced results and we were let in, mainly because a gang were about to leave (it operates a one-out, one-in policy at very busy times). It claims to have the fifth smallest bar in the world, and although the actual drinking area is three times that of the Nutshell in Bury St Edmunds, the actual bar really is small - I'd say no more than 2.5 to 3 feet in diameter - and features a coin tray that slides in and out from under a narrow shelf to save space (notes are kept in a bag hanging on the back of the cellar door!). The pub is very narrow as well, which makes moving about difficult, but we managed to look into both its snugs whilst drinking a pint of reasonable Tetley's bitter at £2 a pint. Apart from its size, the main thing you notice about the pub is the incredible number of photographs plastering the walls; mainly old stars from the nearby music hall and theatre, most in pantomime costume. A fair array of photos of sporting personalities who'd also supped there (George Best, Aussie cricketers, George Best, some boxers, George Best etc...) graced the second room.

We were beginning to gasp for air and something that wasn't Tetley's, so we moved on down the road to the Peveril of the Peak, another Grade II-listed pub with beautiful stained glass around the bar, doors and partitions, and yet more rich tilework. According to the National Inventory, it was saved from demolition for a road scheme by CAMRA and others in the 1980s. Among its five handpumps I was delighted to see Hobgoblin, an old friend from Reading days and a perfect change from the Tetley's (I didn't note the price as it was someone else's round). This pub is much bigger than it looks from the outside, with three rooms, and we found space here to sit down and rest for a while.

At our next stop, the Briton's Protection (a mere 100 yards away), we were almost put off by the large red neon sign on the outside, but we ploughed on and found it to be well worth entering. This pub is yet another Grade-II listed building; it's been a pub since 1820 but the current interior is 1930s. There's a long counter on one side of a horseshoe shaped bar and two smaller snugs round the other side with a hatchway through to the main bar, as well as a tiny snug in a corner of the main bar. I was intrigued by the Western saloon-style two-way gate to the Ladies - not something you usually see in an English pub! - but the most noticeable feature of this pub at first glance is its ornate tiling (that rarest exhibit of Mancunian cultural artefacts). The four handpumps here included Jennings Cumberland and Robinsons Unicorn - two and a half pints of the former and one pint of the latter cost us £8.10.

Our final stop of the night involved a 10 minute stroll (past the wonderful architecture of the Town Hall and its attendant plaza) to Mr Thomas's Chophouse, a long, narrow Grade II-listed building with a beautifully preserved 1901 design scheme. By this time my notes were starting to get rather incoherent. The long narrow bar leads through into a restaurant as we eventually realised after thinking to begin with that we were looking at a mirror. The four handpumps all had national beers on, but Black Sheep and Bass were both perfectly drinkable, although I chose to finish the evening with a Leffe at £2.55 a glass as I couldn't face any more bitter. There is some fantastic woodwork behind the bar, and plenty to look at on the walls, with a selection of old photographs of Manchester dating back to the 1890s.

It was on the whole a very good pub crawl, taking in both good beer and fascinating architecture (sometimes even both in the same place!).

We did make one more stop on the way home the following day, taking a slightly circuitous route to call in at the Castle in Macclesfield - our final Grade II-listed pub of the weekend. The Castle has four rooms, all of which we were shown by the friendly landlord. A series of Vanity Fair "Men of the Day" caricatures and an impressive array of brass platters are on display in a beautifully upholstered and cosy snug with an unusual centre-opening door (the width of a normal door cut in half down the middle). The small front bar was empty, the locals evidently preferring the cleverly lit (thanks to some internal windows) and larger back bar, which has even more brass over its walls. There was a nasty outbreak of tapestries in the central lobby/hallway (loosely based on local views), and a raised room at the very back of the pub for dining. We amused ourselves for some time watching the locals playing cards and listening to their banter (a lot of local pride evident in their tales). A pint of Theakston Best here cost £2, and was quite drinkable, although it's not one of my favourites. The pub is well worth a visit if you're in the area.

Sophie Watson

Back to Intro