The Fitzroy Tavern is a public house situated at 16 Charlotte Street in the Fitzrovia district of central London, England, to which it gives its name.
It is currently owned by the Samuel Smith Brewery. It became famous during a period spanning the 1920s to the mid 1950s as a meeting place for many of London's artists, intellectuals and bohemians such as Dylan Thomas, Augustus John, and George Orwell.
It is named either directly or indirectly after the Fitzroy family, Dukes of Grafton, who owned much of the land on which Fitzrovia was built.
The building was originally constructed as the Fitzroy Coffee House, in 1883, and converted to a pub (called “The Hundred Marks”) in 1887, by William Mortimer Brutton. In the early years of the 20th century, Judah Morris Kleinfeld purchased it. He rebranded it "the Fitzroy Tavern" in March 1919.The licence then passed to his daughter and her husband Charles Allchild who ran it into the 1950s His granddaughter Sally Fiber who worked behind the bar from a very young age eventually wrote a history of the pub "The Fitzroy: The Autobiography of a London Tavern" with the help of Clive Powell-Williams. There are photographs on the walls of both Micheal Bentine and Dylan Thomas drinking in the pub. There is also a photograph of George Orwell (but not actually sitting in the pub). One of the reasons for the pub reputedly being so popular with Orwell and Thomas is its proximity to Broadcasting House and Langham Place - both worked for the BBC in the 1940s and '50s and the pub continues to be popular with media types.
Given the pub's low prices and proximity to University College London, it is very popular with UCL students. English and History students in particular are known to be frequent visitors. The Cheese Grater, the alternative UCL student magazine, also holds weekly gatherings in the pub.
The Fitzroy Tavern has been a regular gathering place for fans of Doctor Who since the 1980s. Fans meet there, informally, on the first Thursday evening of each month.
Since 2000 it has been the home of the Pear Shaped Comedy Club which runs every Wednesday in the downstairs bar.
Famous quotes containing the word tavern:
“The tavern will compare favorably with the church. The church is the place where prayers and sermons are delivered, but the tavern is where they are to take effect, and if the former are good, the latter cannot be bad.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)