Old Crow, Hove

This pub was originally known as The Vault. Around the turn of this century it was transformed into The Three Graces, with elaborate Italianate design and wall decorations. But it closed in the early 2020s, and has recently (2025) reopened as The Old Crow.

Its reincarnation under its present name involved the removal of the Italianate decorations, but this seems to have revealed old fabric. The pub is a basic street corner boozer, catering predominantly for locals.

The fittings and décor now appear authentically old, from the linotiled and parquet flooring (green and cream old-looking linotiles on the left hand side of the pub, parquet closer to the counter), to the dark green fielded panelling on the walls at windowsill level, to the wooden faced counter on the right hand side of the pub with more fielded panelling. The counter top is on two levels (lower to the right as you look at the bar) suggesting that the counter might have been reconstructed perhaps with one half of the present counter moved from a different part of this small pub. (Having said that there is no obvious division in the counter front.) The bar back is modern. There are two external doors – one on the corner of Portland Road, one on the left hand wall into a side street – which suggests a lost partition, and a pillar towards the rear of the pub reinforces that impression. A corridor to the rear of the pub now leads past the end of the counter to the toilets, but might once have served as a bottle and jug department entered from the side door.