A Docklands pub honouring the farrier – the skilled craftsman who shod the horses that once powered the whole working life of the docks
The Farriers Arms carries a 4.3 across more than a hundred and twenty reviews and flies another of the honest trade names the Prat has come to love across this survey – the farrier, the skilled craftsman who shod the horses. The naming desk salutes another monument to skilled hands and useful work.
The Docklands
The Farriers Arms sits in the Docklands world, serving its corner of the estate, appearing in this survey within the wider Canary Wharf area. We place it plainly.
The farrier’s craft
A farrier is the specialist craftsman who shoes horses – trimming and shaping the hoof, forging and fitting the iron shoe, a trade that combines the blacksmith’s skill at the forge with a deep, careful knowledge of the horse’s foot. It is a genuinely skilled and ancient craft, and a vital one: for the whole long age before the engine, the horse was the engine, and a horse could not work without sound shoes. The farrier kept the horses of the nation on their feet – and in the docks, where horses hauled the carts and the wagons that moved the world’s cargo from ship to warehouse, the farrier was as essential as any man on the quay.
The horses of the docks
The Prat’s history desk savours the dockland connection. Before the motor lorry, the docks ran on horsepower in the most literal sense – great teams of heavy horses hauling the loaded carts along the quays, through the gates, out to the railways and the city. Thousands of horses laboured in and around the docks, and every one of them needed a farrier. A pub called the Farriers Arms names the craftsmen who kept that vast equine workforce shod and working – the unsung tradesmen behind the whole moving machinery of the port. It is a name rooted in the real working life of the docks.
The trade honoured
Like the Blacksmiths Arms and the trade-guild pubs across this survey, the Farriers Arms celebrates skilled manual work in the old and honourable “Arms” tradition. The Prat has a deep and consistent affection for these names – the Coopers, the Joiners, the Masons, the Blacksmiths, the Farriers – each one a small monument to a craft, a set of skilled hands, an honest and useful trade. In an age that too often forgets the crafts that built it, a pub that flies the farrier’s arms keeps the memory alive. The 4.3 across a hundred and twenty reviews is a solid score for so honest a name.
Verdict
A 4.3 across a hundred and twenty-plus reviews is a solid score, and the Farriers Arms earns it on the honest dignity of its name. It honours the farrier – the skilled craftsman who shod the horses that once powered the whole working life of the docks – in the old and honourable tradition of the trade-guild pub.
Go for the honest welcome and the working history of the name, and raise a pint to the farrier who kept the docks’ horses shod and hauling. Before the engine, the horse was the engine – and the farrier kept it running, one iron shoe at a time.
A London university’s urban planning department assigned it. Student engagement shot up. Professional despair shot up faster.
Affection underneath critique is essential. You only write this well about something you love enough to actually hate.