The Tipperary, Fleet Street
A hostelry claiming the title of London’s inaugural Irish pub and the first to sell Guinness, to homesick Irish soldiers and labours, the accuracy of which is hotly disputed.
Just a stones thrown from London icon St. Paul’s Cathedral Fleet Street was London’s original Street of Shame. It still boasts many superb hostelries that thisrty printers and muckraking journalists drank in until the 1980s.
Originally the Boars Head and rebuilt just after the Great Fire of London in 1666 The Tipperary has been significantly altered over time but remains one of Fleet Streets finest drinking dens.
I used this pub regularly between 2003 – 2006 and would often sit upstairs in the window table blazing my way through a deck of twenty with a few pints. While it’s a dirty habit and I quit years ago its hard to believe the smoking ban came in nearly 14 years ago. Its odd to think many people around the thirty year mark never experienced what it used to be like.
Let’s have it right, its infinitely better and healthier now and the benefits are plentiful. However, smoky dark intimate boozers did enhance a pubs traditional atmosphere and the ban is one of I believe ten contributing factors why so many pubs have shut in the last 80 years. (see Why do pubs close? in the pub musings tab) Covid and this governments manage of it will be the eleventh reason.
The most pleasing thing about Fleet Street hostelries is they were designed for one thing only which is having a booze. Unlike many changing areas of London where gastronomy is the primary focus a traditional wet led boozer is what you find here in the City of London. As well as the press, legal eagles from the Courts of Justice and the Old Bailey have also drank here for centuries and the sense of being in historic London never leaves you whilst imbibing within the local taverns walls.
The interior sees thirsty punters mostly standing necking pints against a backdrop of wood panelled walls and beautiful etched mirrors. It feels traditional yet informal and an authentic Irish pub unlike many of the manufactured chain offerings. However, it does do food upstairs at wallet friendly prices – all dishes are £9 or under – but the jewel in its crown, for this anorak at least, is the shamrock mosaic which is a thing of beauty.
The dumb waiter servicing upstairs and it’s wonky floors is also a nice touch and relatively rare in London pubs. Always bustling with tourists, suits and fluid London life this is a classic example of a proper central London boozer worth travelling for.
