Berkeley Hotel, Scunthorpe

The Berkeley is a large roadhouse brick built pub/hotel on a massive plot that was built in the late 1930s and opened in 1940. Very helpfully there is the press cutting about the opening in a frame in the lounge bar and states it was built by Councillor and Mrs Kennedy, the architects were Messrs Scott & Clarke of Wednesbury, West Midlands and the contractors were Messrs T H Nichols of Walsall. It states Samuel Smiths supplied (not owned) the pub.

It retains its original layout of three bars (one now primarily a dining room), a ballroom and spacious entrance lobby, also the off sales is there but used for storage and has lost its fitments. There were changes to some fittings in the 1990s otherwise it is very much 'as built'. Upstairs there is a meeting room (formerly the lounge for guests) and eight bedrooms, which are still in use at around £35 plus £5 for a continental breakfast but signs warn that the rooms do not have TV’s (due to Samuel Smiths policy of no music or TV’s in their pubs!).

The T-shaped lobby retains its 1930s reception on the right, a display case as you enter, a gents toilet on the left with new tiles in 1930s style and alongside a tiny cubby hole marked ‘Cloaks’. To the left are double doors and surrounding screenwork which are a modern 're-creation' of how these may have looked in the 1930s. Beyond them the lounge bar retains an original counter with a trough in front designed for counter-spillages and drips, the bar back looks original but the top part may be a Sam Smiths replacement, as it is different in style from the one in the public bar. The fireplace is from the 1930s but was imported in the 1990s. The seating is of Art Deco style but likely to be of recent age (but may be the original just re-upholstered?). The Art Deco style lighting is a modern replacement.

There is a wide staircase to the first floor and to the right is the dining room with double doors, a dado of plain interwar panelling (some may be new work) which runs across the bar counter, original bar back but the fireplace is a replacement. To the far right is the ballroom which is essentially 'as built' but the decoration has been comprehensively upgraded. This large room has a 60’ by 30’ maple floor, big kitchen at the front and a stage at the rear. There are lots of 1930s leaded glass windows throughout.

To get to the public bar you have to go outside and round the left hand side of the building where you will see the disused door of the off sales and almost at the rear of the building there is a door that leads into a terrazzo floored porch and lobby. The gents’ off here retains its original 1930s tiled walls (new urinals), ladies possibly the same? The public bar retains its original counter, original bar back with only a minor change to insert one small fridge. There is an Art Deco stone fireplace (replacement) and the fixed seating is original.