June 2025: Droogs, Leopards, Limehouse Legends & London's Biggest Pub
A monthly newsletter about London beer and pubs written by Will Hawkes
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Rock and a Hard Place
Less than 200 feet from the front door of Rock Leopard Brewing Co’s home in Thamesmead, South East London, is the neighbourhood’s most famous physical feature. It’s South Mere, an artificial lake - or, as Anthony Burgess had it in his 1962 book, A Clockwork Orange, "Flatblock Marina". When Stanley Kubrick turned the book into a film in 1971, this was the backdrop to one of the key scenes, with chief Droog Alex asserting his dominance with a bit of the old ultraviolence.
On a warm day this week, Droogs are in short supply. Actually, Thamesmead - or at least, the part close to the lake’s southern tip, where you’ll find Rock Leopard - is looking pretty good. As someone who cut their teeth on a local newspaper, and for whom Thamesmead was a byword for urban decay and general grimness, it’s a surprise. Thamesmead is clearly not what it was. The arrival of the Elizabeth Line in nearby Abbey Wood - a 10-minute walk - makes this perhaps the best connected neighbourhood in Zone 4. You can be in Canary Wharf in 15 minutes.
It’s been a long time coming. Stacey Ayeh, the man behind Rock Leopard, was brought up in North London but was lured south 23 years ago by talk of how things were going to change. “I was sold a dream,” he says with a wry smile. “I saw an advert in a newspaper, it said - ‘come to Thamesmead, it’s an up-and-coming area!’ 23 years on, here we are.”
There have been plenty of roadblocks where Rock Leopard is concerned. Founded in 2017 by Stacey, an industry veteran and former importer with Koppaberg and Nils Oscar on his CV, Rock Leopard has lacked a home until now, but not for lack of effort. He has spent three years trying to secure a unit in Cygnet Square, a period characterised by frustrating encounters with planning officers, licensing officials and building control. At one point, he was gazumped by Starbucks; overall, £43,000 has been spent.
“It’s been madness,” he says. “It’s been a crazy process.”
But now Rock Leopard has a base, and a good one, too - right on the square, the new heart of Thamesmead. For the last few weeks, the bar has been open at weekends, a boon for locals who had begun to believe the brewery was a figment of estate agents’ imaginations. “When we first opened, someone said they thought we were an urban myth,” he says. “‘Has anyone seen this brewery, has anyone tasted the beer?!’”
The unit is largely bare now, but on the floor are laid out plans of how it will look when it’s completed. The brewing equipment along one wall, fermenters nearby; lots of tables; food, including pizza and pop-up options (the first openings have seen Jollof rice and salt-beef bagels on offer). Stacey has permission for drinkers to sit outside until 9pm every evening, a huge boon since that covers a large space.
And then there’s the beer, which is currently contract-brewed at Drop Project, across South London in Mitcham. There’ll be a variety of options when the bar is fully up and running, although Rock Leopard is undeniably best known for hoppy modern beers. “I think my beers are great,” Stacey says. “They’re on a level with other products that are out there.”
There’s still a long way to go, more hoops to jump through. Stacey sees the unit being fully operational “by next Christmas”. It’s not an easy time for London breweries - plenty have closed in the last 12 months or so - but he feels a brewpub will give him a fighting chance. They're the best model for small craft brewers, he insists.
Inherent to that is bringing new people in, he adds. “The other week, [in the brewery] there was a headteacher talking to an aerospace engineer, talking to someone who installs fibre optic cables, talking to someone who works for a gas supply company. They all live within 300 metres of here, but they wouldn’t have met without this place. That’s what we want to do.”
And no-one else seems to have twigged about Thamesmead. “From where we are, there’s probably an eight-mile radius before you get to the next craft brewery,” he says. “It took a long time for the Elizabeth Line to arrive, but it’s arrived now, and it’s a game-changer. It’s phenomenal.”
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Stout Fellow
London beer has lost two titans in the last few weeks. Firstly there was Martyn Cornell, historian and writer, whose fierce intellect and congenial style will be much missed. He took the lead in exploring London’s beer history, exploding much-cherished myths and establishing a far clearer understanding of how styles like Porter emerged and evolved - and in the process, shining light on the history of London itself. He could be brusque in print, but in person he was always genial and interested in others.
And then there’s Ken Don, Youngs’ final head brewer and a passionate supporter of both Maris Otter malt and cask ale. Roger Protz has written his obit for the Guardian.
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Citizen Clem
What’s in a name? In Limehouse, perhaps, signs of a subtle cultural shift. The Craft Beer Co, one of the key drivers of London’s craft beer culture a decade back, had decided to rename its E14 pub the Clement Attlee, celebrating the Labour Prime Minister who was Limehouse MP between 1922 and 1950 (when the constituency was abolished).
Why, though? “I love the name and I think it's very fitting that Limehouse' greatest son has a pub celebrating him,” Craft Beer Co founder and owner Martin Hayes tells me via email. “There was one in Fulham [near the housing estate of the same name] but that was demolished long ago.”
If you, like me, detect a subtle shift towards a more traditional pub naming model, you might be right, although Hayes rejects the notion that his pubs are following a trend towards “geezer-core” (“I am not sure I buy into all that jazz”). The group’s last opening, The Bear in Paddington, was also more traditionally named - but Craft Beer Co pubs have always looked fairly traditional, with brewery mirrors, handpumps, and comfortable bench seating.
And what about the others? “There are no active plans to rename any of the other pubs, but I wouldn't rule it out,” he says. “Lots of people know The Craft Beer Co and its been very good for us, we are proud of it, but perhaps combining it with great pub names will be the way we go in the future,” he says.
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Step Up
The Walsh family, which runs Putney’s marvellous Bricklayers, has taken on a pub in East London: The Peacock in Stepney. I haven’t been, yet, but based on what they’ve achieved in Putney this should be worth visiting.
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McWins
Much-cherished King’s Cross pub McGlynn’s, which has been closed since landlord Gerry Dolan died in 2023, has been sold - and according to estate agents Sidney Phillips, it will remain a pub. “The new owner intends to keep the traditional style that patrons have enjoyed for many years, even down to the name, retaining the family legacy after 40 years of ownership,” they say.
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Kraft Beer
This week I wrote about German Kraft, the brewery established in a food market at Elephant and Castle in 2017, for Pellicle. The model is currently being rolled out across Europe - meaning a London brewery is selling lager back to the Germans.
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Two Pubs, One City
Brewdog Bar, Compton Stand, Lord’s; Bowlers’ Bar, Pavilion, Lord’s
“I call it Wingnut now,” chuckles an Australian in the row behind me at Lord’s Cricket Ground. I’m not sure this is what Brewdog intended when they called their bland-ish pale ale Wingman, but it’s hard to know what they intend these days. The company changes direction every six weeks.
Last November, for example, when I came to the announcement of the Scottish brewery’s deal with Lord’s, James Arrow was CEO. He was the smooth corporate face of a company that had turned its back on the wild days of youth. Now he’s gone, in March, nine months after arriving. Then, a few weeks’ ago, there was a rebrand, designed to signify a “new era”. Key people seem to be leaving all the time. If you were a cynical person, you might conclude Brewdog was in trouble.
Not that anyone at Lord’s cares about that. It’s the first day of the ICC World Test Championship, cricket’s latest ruse to inject competitive meaning into a sport which is better off without it. The game is terribly modern now, don’t you know - you can even get craft beer.
And there’s no reason why you wouldn’t. A cricket ground during a Test cricket, as anyone who’s experienced it knows, is the biggest pub in town. It’s Bacchanalian, like when Ian Nairn went to Oktoberfest. While I, a sophisticate who understands the value of self-denial, refuse to take a drink until 12pm, others are already laying into it at 10.30am, pretty much as soon as they arrive at the ground. Imagine Heathrow Spoons at 5am, but with cricket.
And Lord’s, despite its haughty reputation, is as bad as anywhere else - perhaps worse because (in contrast to every other cricket ground in the world) you can still take a bottle of wine in.
There’s plenty for sale inside, too, although what you can get depends on where you’re sitting. When Arrow announced the Lord’s deal, he added there would be cask ale, but only for the members. There’s certainly none at the bar in the Upper Compton, which has Wingnut - sorry, Wingman - and Cold Beer, a low-ABV lager. I suspect if there is cask ale, it’s available in the pavilion, where you’ll find the Bowlers Bar. Here MCC members can watch the cricket while necking the booze of their choice.
I would go and check, but alas they won’t let me in, for two main reasons. One, I’m an iconoclastic rebel who refuses to tow the corporate line and (I very much suspect) they’re worried my revolutionary rhetoric would be too much for the MCC squares; and two, I’m not a member, and only members are allowed in.
Anyway, I prefer it here with the plebs - or, as they call them at Lord’s, those who went to minor public schools. This is definitely a craft-beer crowd. In the row behind me, Mr Wingnut and his Pommie pal are discussing craft beer, and specifically Wingman.
Too fruity for me, says the Pom.
I’ve had five, says the Aussie.
I live near Gipsy Hill, says the Englishman. Nice beer. They’re owned by something bigger now, but I think you have to be. Still brewed locally.
A lot of breweries going out of business in Australia, says the Aussie.
I’m sure it’s the same here, says the Englishman. We’re big craft-beer fans, he adds, apropos of nothing.
It’s friendly stuff, probably because it’s South Africa playing Australia and not England. Actually, most of the crowd is South African, who turn out to be much meeker then you might expect. All the gobshites are Aussies, including one bloke right at the back who keeps referring to Steve Smith as “Tha Kinga Lordzz”, blurting out “Webstaaa” and finally shouting something so incomprehensible that an Aussie in the row in front asks, “What did he just say?”
Lord’s often had a diverse crowd - due to cricket’s popularity in the sub-continent and Caribbean - but it's pretty white today. The contrast with the young, mostly black staff at the Compton Stand bar is unmissable.
All the beer is served in hard plastic glasses, for which you pay a £1 deposit. Beer is pre-poured, meaning there’s no foam and most glasses are not full - Stockport CAMRA would have a fit, but no-one here seems to care, even if it costs £7.50 a go. The punters only get upset when they get the wrong beer (“Is this an IPA? I ordered an IPA”) or when the bar closes suddenly at 5.30pm, with half an hour of cricket still to play.
One be-mulleted Aussie arrives at the bar at 5.35pm, to be told there is no beer. “What about the beer in the fridge?” There isn’t any, he’s told by a fellow in an ill-fitting suit, even though there obviously is. He gets over it quite quickly; the last I see, he’s instigated a group hug with the bar staff.
I very much doubt they’ve stopped serving in the pavilion, though. In fact I can see them still drinking, using my binoculars (crucial for a day at the cricket). Absolutely sickening. If only there were some iconoclastic rulebreakers around who might stand up against this sort of inequality, but they’re in short supply at Lord’s.
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London Beer City is written by journalist Will Hawkes. Feel free to contact me on londonbeercity@gmail.com. If you like what you’ve read, please share it with your friends; if you’ve been forwarded this email and enjoyed it, you can sign up here. Unsubscribe here. Help me keep the newsletter free here. Thanks for reading!