Vault Review: The Best Rooms in London Were Never Meant for People | Coal cellars, banking halls, lavatories and vaults – the finest drinking spaces in this survey were all service spaces
Cepages Review: The Brackets Are Part of the Name | A French wine bar has put square brackets in its own title, and a 4.6 from 361 people suggests nobody minds
Stables Bar Review: 4.9 From 851 People Should Not Be Possible | The highest genuine rating in this entire survey, on a sample large enough that we cannot explain it away
Efes Review: Ephesus Had One of the Seven Wonders and a Man Burned It for Fame | He destroyed the Temple of Artemis so that his name would be remembered, and they made it illegal to say it
Be At One Lyceum Review: Flair Is Harder Than It Looks | Throwing a bottle over your shoulder is a genuine skill, a genuine risk, and a genuine argument inside the trade
Daly’s Review: A Beer Hall Is a German Idea and It Was Political | The bierkeller was where people met when meeting was difficult, and that is why governments watched them
Rosti Bar Limited Review: One Review, and a Company Number | Five stars from a single person, and a name that is a limited company – the second we have found in one postcode
Jack Solomons Review: He Ran British Boxing Out of a Soho Gym | A fishmonger’s son from the East End who became the most powerful promoter in Europe and had his gym on Great Windmill Street
Lockside Review: A Lock Uses the Water to Hold Itself Shut | No engine, no pump, no power – it is gravity and two gates, and the harder the water pushes the tighter it seals
Old Vic Review: The Theatre Was Saved by a Woman Nobody Names | Lilian Baylis ran it on almost no money, founded two national companies out of it, and is remembered by a plaque
Wellington Review: A 3.7, and the Beef Is Probably Not His | Beef Wellington may have nothing to do with the Duke at all, and the earliest recipe is not English
White Swan Review: A 3.2, and the Black Swan Broke Philosophy | Every swan in Europe was white, so all swans were white – and then somebody went to Australia
Rumba Review: The Dance Britain Learned Is Not the Dance | Cuban rumba is drums and voices and no melody instrument at all, and what we call rumba is something else entirely
North Circle Bar Review: There Is a Road With Almost That Name | Forty-three reviews, a 4.0, and a name that is one letter away from the most hated road in London
Barfly Review: The Room Where You Play Your First Gig | Every band that ever filled a stadium played a room like this to forty people on a Tuesday
All Bar One Review: The Chain the Last Survey Put on Trial | A 4.6 branch of the chain whose matched pairs proved, last time, that the street matters more than the bar
Crossroads Review: They Buried Suicides at the Crossroads | Denied consecrated ground, buried at a junction, sometimes with a stake – and it was legal in England until 1823
Cafe del Marsh Review: The Marsh Is Still Under You | Lambeth Marsh was drained, not removed, and the water is still there and still has to be managed
Canalside Review: A 3.6, and Twenty-Two People Decided It | Deep in the dead zone, on the canal, in the market – three separate penalties on one venue
Chaplin Review: He Was Born Four Streets From Here and Grew Up in the Workhouse | Lambeth, poverty, a mother in an asylum – and he became the most famous human being alive
Brera Review: A Lounge Was Where You Lounged and the Word Is Doing Nothing | Every bar in Britain calls itself a lounge, and the word has been emptied completely
Charlotte Review: She Was the First Royal to Have a Christmas Tree | A German queen, married at seventeen to a man she had never met, and she brought the tree fifty years before Albert
180 Club Review: The Maximum Is 180 and the Board Is Rigged | The numbers around a dartboard are arranged to punish inaccuracy, and the arrangement is the whole game
Coyote Ugly Review: The Bar Came From a Film About a Bar | A real New York bar inspired a film, and the film then franchised the bar back out across the world
The Cut Review: A Cut Is an Artificial Channel | The street is named after a canal that was never finished, and the word survives in canals across England
Bebidas Review: It Just Means Drinks | No rating, no reviews, and a name so plain it is almost the eleventh honest name in the survey
Drop Bar Review: A Drop Was a Measure Nobody Could Define | It was used in medicine for centuries, it varies with the liquid and the dropper, and it was eventually abandoned
Shochu Review: Japan’s Real National Spirit Is Not Sake and It Is Distilled | Sake is brewed, shochu is distilled, and the Japanese drink far more of the second one
Southwark Tap Review: Southwark Means the Southern Defensive Work | It was the fortified bridgehead guarding the only crossing, and it existed to defend London from the south
Wild IS Earth Review: Wild Fermentation Is Just Not Adding Yeast | The microbes were already on the fruit, in the air, and on the hands – and for most of history nobody knew they existed
