White Hart, New Cross

Built c.1870 of three-storeys by Watney’s Brewery of London stock brick with a tiled ground floor. The ox blood-coloured exterior tiling incorporates advertisements for (on the left) “Reid’s Stout” (on the right ) “Watney’s Ales”. Thick paint had been applied in recent times but thankfully the tiling and advertisements were returned to their original condition in 2015. Four exterior doors are evidence of the former multi-room layout. The original layout consisted of a public bar on the left (may have been subdivided); saloon bar on the front right separated from the public bar by a toilet and a short partition between the exterior wall and halfway along the east facing counter front; and at the rear right a function or billiard room. It is believed that the partition mentioned in the listing description (1999) was a modern insertion and has since been removed.

The interior is now open-plan and through an impressive wide arch with brackets spaced regularly along it is an area at the rear on a lower level and with no old fittings. The front L-shaped part of the pub has a bare wood floor, there are two cast iron columns with elaborate capitals painted gold within the servery and some original ceiling decoration remains.

The original bar back fitting remains substantially intact albeit that there have been some changes in recent years. It faces two-sides with five bays on the right including some very old aged mirrors, a couple of Watney’s stag logos (which look modern), cut and etched glass and gilded glass advertisements for “wines” and “liqueurs”. There is a suspended clock with a carved surround including ‘1874’. On the left hand side there are four bays with some deep cut mirror panels some of which look modern. Two-thirds of lower shelving has been lost to fridges.

The bar counter is the original although two small sections on the far right (one served the rear function room) were lost in changes in 2000 to create an upstairs hotel. A section of the bar counter that protruded in the south east corner was removed in 2000 and re-instated in 2015 as part of re-instatement works as listed building consent had not been obtained for the changes in 2000. The original bar top had been removed in recent times and replaced with one of chipboard covered in a white plastic material however in 2015 a replacement mahogany one was added. The wood surround fireplace on the left is old but moved from elsewhere and now painted a gastro grey colour.

Much information obtained from Listed Building Consent application No. DC/16/095391 on Lewisham Councils website