Twitter's UK team is heading upmarket. After flirting with taking office space in Regent's Place (just over Euston Road from Warren St tube), they got cold feet when Facebook announced plans to base their UK team in the same block. Now Property week reports that Twitter will flutter to the Crown Estate's AirW1 development near Piccadilly Circus, nestling behind the Cafe Royal - where the Regent Palace Hotel once stood.
BBC types will be pleased anyway; Twitter moving out of serviced offices in Great Titchfield Street should ease lunchtime pressure in the Crown and Sceptre, where social media eaters currently take up more space than the few remaining drinking hacks.
Showing posts with label pubs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pubs. Show all posts
Thursday, December 19, 2013
Monday, October 14, 2013
Mapped out
I don't want to get too soppy about my wonderful readers, but thanks to HB for solving the mystery of the pub that used to sit on the site of Broadcasting House extension.
It was called The Devonshire Arms, and at the time of our ancient map, in the 1890s, fronted onto Duke Street (now Hallam Street) more or less exactly at the entrance to the 1960s extension to Broadcasting House, now superceded by Sir Richard MacCormac's redevelopment.
The landlord in 1891 was Joseph Maslen, 50, originally from Bethnal Green. He ran the pub with his wife, Eliza, 48, and son James, 25, who was a barman. They employed Posie Hughes, 17, from Ramsgate as a barmaid and Florence Brett, 18, from Aldershot as a general servant. Also there were Joe's daughter Eliza, 19, and son Charles, 17, who were both students.
Before taking the Devonshire Arms,Joe Maslen was a carman driving a horse-drawn delivery wagon, probably for a railway company, and the family had lived in Chelsea and then Southwark. In 1881 they were at Sutherland Square in Newington, and Joe was a commercial traveller selling mineral water. He probably made a fair amount of money from The Devonshire because, by 1901, he'd gone up in the world and was a cab proprietor living at Gibson Square in Islington.
The Devonshire Arms was still going strong in 1935 and by then, the landlord, Arthur Walter Jones, was serving customers from the BBC, which had moved to the newly-built Broadcasting House three years earlier; it was the closest pub to BH, a matter of significance to this day. Next door was the Hallam Motor
Club, and at 11 Duke Street was the International Broadcasting Company, set up in 1931 as a commercial rival to the BBC. Owned by Tory MP Captain Leonard Plugge, it made programmes which were aired by radio stations on the continent, including Radio Luxembourg and Radio Normandy (early employer of Roy Plomley).
Which begs the question: Were the elite of the Corporation sitting down for a beer with their downmarket rivals or glaring at each other from opposite ends of the bar?
It was called The Devonshire Arms, and at the time of our ancient map, in the 1890s, fronted onto Duke Street (now Hallam Street) more or less exactly at the entrance to the 1960s extension to Broadcasting House, now superceded by Sir Richard MacCormac's redevelopment.
The landlord in 1891 was Joseph Maslen, 50, originally from Bethnal Green. He ran the pub with his wife, Eliza, 48, and son James, 25, who was a barman. They employed Posie Hughes, 17, from Ramsgate as a barmaid and Florence Brett, 18, from Aldershot as a general servant. Also there were Joe's daughter Eliza, 19, and son Charles, 17, who were both students.
Before taking the Devonshire Arms,Joe Maslen was a carman driving a horse-drawn delivery wagon, probably for a railway company, and the family had lived in Chelsea and then Southwark. In 1881 they were at Sutherland Square in Newington, and Joe was a commercial traveller selling mineral water. He probably made a fair amount of money from The Devonshire because, by 1901, he'd gone up in the world and was a cab proprietor living at Gibson Square in Islington.
The Devonshire Arms was still going strong in 1935 and by then, the landlord, Arthur Walter Jones, was serving customers from the BBC, which had moved to the newly-built Broadcasting House three years earlier; it was the closest pub to BH, a matter of significance to this day. Next door was the Hallam Motor
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| Plugge |
Which begs the question: Were the elite of the Corporation sitting down for a beer with their downmarket rivals or glaring at each other from opposite ends of the bar?
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Crotalus cerastes
The beating heart of Islington, just in front of the Building Design Centre, used to vibrate tunelessly late at night at the Walkabout Bar, with its charming queues and other assorted pavement activities - thankfully now closed. But I see the site is now set to reopen - as the Rattlesnake Live Bar & Kitchen. Stay classy, Islington.
Monday, June 11, 2012
Furrowed
The daughter that fell between two (bar) stools. The Sun's scoop this morning is that David and Samantha Cameron each thought the other had taken 8-year-old daughter Nancy in their car as they left The Plough in Lower Cadsden after Sunday lunch, to return to Chequers. Neither had - Nancy was still in the toilet. The Sun says it was 15 minutes before the Prime Minister returned to pick up his daughter.
The Plough is around two miles from Chequers.
The Plough is around two miles from Chequers.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Help needed
Probably the most famous pub near Broadcasting House in London is The George. In the postwar years it was known as "The Gluepot" for many who gathered there, either because they had work at the BBC, or because they'd finished work at the BBC, or they hoped to have work at the BBC, or they were avoiding work at the BBC. You might see John Ireland, Alan Rawsthorne, Dylan Thomas, William Walton, Louis MacNiece, Constant Lambert, Humphrey Searle and more.
A little further off the beaten track is The Yorkshire Grey, in Langham Street. Its competitive pricing policy over the years (and a relaxed attitude to late licensing hours in the 70s and 80s) established it as a venue for BBC staff of a less stellar reputation; it's code was YG1, mimicking BH studio numbering. Now, in a world of envy, we'd like to beef up its history, ideally beyond that of The George. So far we have established that Arthur Rimbaud and Ezra Pound were customers. It's likely that Rimbaud's chum, Verlaine [Paul, not Tom] popped in for a tincture or two.
But are there more ? Doris Lessing lived at 25 Langham street from 1959 to 1963 - did she like at bottle of brown ? And when did the pub first open ? Surely not when Boswell lived in Great Portland Street (1740-1795) ? Or when Langham St was still Queen Anne Street East, home to Edwin Landseer in 1802 ?
This is a race. Other pubs are on the history kick. The Manic Street Preachers played their first London gig upstairs at The Horse and Groom, on Great Portland Street. Bob Dylan's London debut was at The King & Queen, at the far end of Foley Street. All leads on former top-notch denizens of The Yorkshire Grey most welcome.
A little further off the beaten track is The Yorkshire Grey, in Langham Street. Its competitive pricing policy over the years (and a relaxed attitude to late licensing hours in the 70s and 80s) established it as a venue for BBC staff of a less stellar reputation; it's code was YG1, mimicking BH studio numbering. Now, in a world of envy, we'd like to beef up its history, ideally beyond that of The George. So far we have established that Arthur Rimbaud and Ezra Pound were customers. It's likely that Rimbaud's chum, Verlaine [Paul, not Tom] popped in for a tincture or two.
But are there more ? Doris Lessing lived at 25 Langham street from 1959 to 1963 - did she like at bottle of brown ? And when did the pub first open ? Surely not when Boswell lived in Great Portland Street (1740-1795) ? Or when Langham St was still Queen Anne Street East, home to Edwin Landseer in 1802 ?
This is a race. Other pubs are on the history kick. The Manic Street Preachers played their first London gig upstairs at The Horse and Groom, on Great Portland Street. Bob Dylan's London debut was at The King & Queen, at the far end of Foley Street. All leads on former top-notch denizens of The Yorkshire Grey most welcome.
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