The Black Friar, 174 Queen Victoria Street, Blackfriars, EC4
The lone, flatiron building alongside the railway line opposite Blackfriars Station is The Black Friar, built in 1875 on the site of the Dominican priory that gave the area its name.
The gilt and marble interior is overlaid with bronze art nouveauish friezes of industrious monks, admonishing the drinkers with severe warnings: “Finery is foolery”, “Haste is waste” or “Industry is all”. It all looks charmingly ancient, until you notice that the monks on the exterior are advertising Worthington Ale and Booth’s Gin.
What makes the pub such a treasure is that, in 1904, the pub was given an Arts and Crafts makeover that is, frankly, high camp. Unbelievably, the pub was due for demolition in the Sixties, until saved by a campaign headed by poet John Betjeman.
The Black Friar is the pub where Lord Risley, the aristo with a taste for the military, gets into trouble with a guardsman in the Merchant-Ivory film of EM Forster’s posthumously-published Maurice.
Maurice (1987, dir: James Ivory)
» Back