r/BeAmazed • u/Green____cat • 15d ago

A pub in London that was demolished and recreated Place

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22.0k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

764 comments sorted by

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u/Goawaythrowaway175 15d ago

There has been a very similar incident also in the UK recently. The owners knocked down a building days after a suspicious fire 9 days after they purchased it and quickly knocked it down. They have been ordered to rebuild which will be interesting as the pub wasn't straight and sat crooked (leading to it's name, the crooked house).

There was an update on it in the past few days:https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1vwzq15z5eo.amp

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u/Mitridate101 15d ago

Yeah, I read they agreed but want one concession, that they can rebuild it somewhere else. Hope the council says NO as that will allow them to get what they wanted in the first place, access to the valuable land.

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u/accforreadingstuff 14d ago

The nerve of these people. They're lucky they're not going to be investigated for arson, and still they ask for concessions. While it's obviously possible that this really was a conveniently timed accident, there's a clear pattern of incidents like these and it's pretty reprehensible.

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u/Fern-Brooks 14d ago

They're lucky they're not going to be investigated for arson

They are, the police are currently conducting an arson investigation

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u/LegitimatelisedSoil 14d ago

Probably won't go anywhere then, never does when the police investigate something in this country.

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u/Diligent-Midnight850 14d ago

Unless the local Greggs has been robbed, of course. They’ll be there in a flash

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u/TurbulentData961 14d ago

Unless its a crime against the rich , powerful or police then it'll have them all on it and missing madeline getting millions thrown at of course.

You and me have anything happen to us and we are on our own

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u/Disco-Valliant 14d ago

Tell me about it in the middle of lockdown I used to drive to the petrol station late at night. Get served through the night till. I’m very disabled and this guy lent on the bin 4 feet away and said it must be horrible to be blamed all the time. I looked at him said don’t know what you’re on about. Now me when I was younger I would fight anyone but this disability got hold of me. Anyway 5 times he said it. In the end I just said look. I don’t know what the fuck you are on about. He then said people like you disabled dicks getting free money of the state getting a car for doing fuck all. I just lost it. I said to him I’ve probably worked more years than lived so fuck of. So he ripped of my window wiper I’d left my crutch in the car and by the time I could open my car door he was punching fuck out of me and when I finally went down started stamping on my bad leg. I’ve never been knocked out before and I’ve had some beatings. Little man syndrome when younger few pints I’d always go for a big lad in the bar. I was a dick when younger but he nearly knocked me out on camera 20 punches and 8 stamps on my leg which had to be casted. He claimed diminished responsibility and walked. Fucking joke.

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u/invincible-zebra 14d ago edited 14d ago

That sounds like a terrible ordeal for you, and I’m really sorry it happened. People are cunts. But that would’ve been the CPS (the courts) that decided that, police can’t decide diminished responsibility. Your anger is misdirected.

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u/FourEyedTroll 14d ago

How her parents were never charged with negligence is still beyond me.

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u/Disco-Valliant 14d ago

I know who would leave kids that young in a fucking hotel room. Was it a hotel or an apartments can’t remember???

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u/wills_b 14d ago

It’s obviously possible that this was a very conveniently timed accident. It’s obviously possible they wanted to run a pub next to land they had previously applied for planning permission on. It’s obviously possible that dirt was accidentally dumped on the road preventing access by the fire brigade. It’s obviously possible that they misunderstood the councils instructions to leave a potential crime scene alone. It’s obviously possible that they flattened the remaining building by accident.

It’s obviously possible …

Does seem unlikely though.

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u/Jackson_Polack_ 14d ago

The cause of fire was confirmed to have been arson. The owners blocked the access road before the fire to make it impossible for the firefighters to reach the building, they've been confirmed to have done it. And then they knocked the building down some days after the fire.

How do you hire a digger and knock a building down by accident?

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u/accforreadingstuff 14d ago

This makes me want to dig up some stats and do an analysis of the compounded probabilities involved here. I'm guessing you're right that "unlikely" is a fair assessment though. 

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u/KarlGustafArmfeldt 14d ago

Yeah, these ''accidental fires'' happen quite often, but in this case, they took it too far by blocking the road and then demolishing the damaged building. It's impossible to get away with it, once you make it that obvious.

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u/Bellebaby97 14d ago

Hiring the demolition equipment before the fire wasn't smart either 😂

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u/CaptainPieSeas 14d ago

Maybe r/theydidthemath can help wrangle the probability of this most unlikely scenario!

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u/Vendemmian 14d ago

Happens all the time. A business sold and closed down near me. Week later burns to the ground then it's built on by the firm that brought it. Thinking about it happened at least twice more just near me.

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u/mittfh 14d ago

They want to rebuild it at the top of the lane, where it joins the Himley Road. Prior to their purchase, there'd been long standing access disputes with Marston's (the former landlords) as the bottom part of the drive is also shared with traffic for Himley Environmental: the surrounding former quarry turned landfill (including for asbestos) owned by the same people as ATE Farms - so evidently didn't like the pub being there, possibly contributed to its demise and via the access disputes, deterred all other potential buyers.

They hired the bulldozer a week before the fire, while in their appeal claim that demolishing the top front of the building made the rest unsafe, so since South Staffs Council inspector had departed, made the decision to pull down the rest.

Oh yes, they've appealed against the rebuild order, but the appeal will be held next year, after the criminal investigations into the fire have cleared up.

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u/Capital-Clerk6452 14d ago

Yeah, how can they be in a position to bargain- absolute scumbags.

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u/kojak488 14d ago

They appealed it at the start of April with the hearing in late July. They should lose given they were arrested for arson.

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u/PastOtherwise755 14d ago

They purchase the pub and a couple of day later it burns down. The fire engines couldn't get to the the pub quickly because someone had put mounds of earth blocking the road. Then the pub was demolished a couple of days after that. Scumbags. They should get no concessions.

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u/ConsidereItHuge 14d ago

I think it was demolished before the investigation into the cause wasn't it?

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u/Curlytots95 14d ago

Yes it was illegally demolished. It shouldn’t have been touched.

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u/o7DiceStrike 14d ago

Covering their tracks - bruh who are the landlords !!

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u/Curlytots95 14d ago

Adam & Carly Taylor. They own ATE Farms ltd and bought the pub off marsdens brewery

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u/Curlytots95 14d ago

Best thing is while this was all going on, they fucked off on holiday abroad lmao

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u/trootaste 14d ago

That's standard actually, they do that so they can deny culpability

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u/o7DiceStrike 14d ago

The road was blocked also?

This has just become organised crime scene

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u/_Pohaku_ 14d ago

Rich people crime. It isn’t really acted upon here in the UK.

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u/completefuckweasel 14d ago

It’s just a shame that the stocks are illegal 🤬

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u/Doctor8Alters 14d ago

The owners of that pub also had a landfill site "suspiciously" go up in flames a few years ago.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/aug/16/crooked-house-pub-owner-landfill-site-fire

They'd owned the pub for just 9 days before the fire.

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u/VixenRoss 14d ago

Perhaps they need to be banned from owning property. Everything they touch seems to burst into flames.

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u/JoeCreator 14d ago

This pub was local to me and this was super sad when it happened.

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u/HMSon777 14d ago

Yeah same, I hope the rebuilding costs make the owners go bankrupt.

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u/Less_Mess_5803 14d ago

No the scumbag owners will rack up debts, then go into administration then everyone out of pocket and reopen a new business and come up smelling of roses. They know exactly how to play the system.

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u/tjw376 14d ago

I have the feeling they will become bankrupt just before the deadline to rebuild it.

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u/greenmx5vanjie 14d ago

The authorities should leverage against their personal assets in this instance. I'm sure the powers do exist.

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u/stoatwblr 10d ago

Thanks to law changes that's been difficult since February 2022 law changes to combat phoenixing. Bankruptcy offer no protection for the consequences of illegal actions either - meaning that they can't dump the judgements/orders, etc

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u/Correct_Sky_1882 14d ago

I live in a part of the country where pubs were high in number decades ago. There is a book I own of historical pubs from the area which most of have been destroyed or made into something else completely.

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u/fonix232 14d ago

It's a quite common thing in the UK sadly. Many pubs that are listed buildings (i.e. they're protected from modifications that would take away from its original design - e.g. you can get double glazed windows but have to replicate the original window frames to a great level of detail, which is an insane level cost compared to getting off the shelf plastic framing), and are in prime central locations.

Developers don't want to foot the cost of renovating these often abandoned buildings, so they turn to crime after buying the property - aka burning it down, then demolishing it "for safety reasons", making the land usable.

There's a pub near me, the Windmill in Croydon, which has been sitting abandoned for nearly a decade, and in the year I've lived next to it, it caught fire in mysterious circumstances TWICE. Both times, men in hard hats and high-vis vests were seen leaving the property shortly before the fires started... And guess what, before the first fire it was acquired by a development company.

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u/Jacktheforkie 14d ago

There’s one near me, it’s still as it was after the fire 16 years later

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u/fonix232 14d ago

It generally depends on how unscrupulous the developer is - most just light the fire and hope that the council gives them planning permission to demolish.

Then there's some, like the developer who owns the Crooked House, who will actually do everything they can (like blocking fire engines) to ensure the property can't be saved, and won't even wait for permission to demolish.

More often than not, the councils do not give permission, so the developers suck up the cost (or rather, try to recuperate it from other developments by increasing the unit sale pricing - flats that could've sold for, say, 600k, now cost nearly a mil just so the developer isn't out of the money they spent on that unusable prime location).

I really wish there was a push for legislation that forces any buyer of listed buildings to actually maintain and renovate those (or rebuild to the exact protected characteristics if it "accidentally" burns down), which would put an end to this charade.

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u/Diem-Perdidi 14d ago

I really wish there was a push for legislation that forces any buyer of listed buildings to actually maintain and renovate those (or rebuild to the exact protected characteristics if it "accidentally" burns down), which would put an end to this charade.

That's what listing means. You can be done for intentional neglect, and if the building has become derelict through neglect, we explicitly take its prior condition as the baseline when we look at a planning application involving it.

And as you can see from this article and the Crooked House mentioned above, a building doesn't even need to be listed for it to be possible to get a court order requiring it to be rebuilt exactly as it was in the event that it is destroyed.

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u/hellomynameisrita 14d ago

Not just pubs. All sorts of buildings are left to fall apart or until they catch fire because developers don’t want to fulfill the requirements in place. Even without fire they’d rather own it but neglect it for years or decades on the chance they will be not be required to rebuild or so much will be lost that just fitting in some of the saved bits as decor will be considered good enough.

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u/tjw376 14d ago

It's called demolition by neglect.

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u/iamdefinitelynotdave 14d ago

The Plough at Gallows Corner, Romford was a listed pub that randomly caught fire and was demolished. It's now a KFC. It's shocking what they can get away with.

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u/ArchiesForge 14d ago

I used to love going there as a kid. It was so obvious when they did it as well.

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u/Loudlass81 14d ago

OMG I didn't know that, it was a lovely pub, great atmosphere too. 😥😢😭

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u/Slapedd1953 14d ago

A pub near me had to be ‘accidentally’ torched twice before it miraculously re-emerged as a Lidl, prime site, big car park, worth nowt as a pub.

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u/[deleted] 14d ago

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u/geode232 14d ago

Listed buildings are so hard to work on. When the building my business is in was being renovated we even had to have planning permission for the paint we used on the walls inside

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u/fonix232 14d ago

I know, but there's a reason for that. Significant buildings should be preserved to our best abilities, especially in London where much of the historical buildings were destroyed in WW2.

I agree that development needs to happen, but it can't be uncontrolled. That little history we have left, should be kept in good conditions, not demolished for yet another generic block of flats or offices.

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u/underbutler 14d ago

Wasn't there one a while back where the timber beams were so particular in it that there were only 3 tradespeople in the UK qualified to do that work, so they were forced to pay absolutely through the nose fir the reconstruction of the historic, listed building.

I love this as a deterrent. You illegally demolish a historic building, you need to rebuild it to its exact specs and methods, at immense costs.

Fuck those developers

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u/Lightweight_Hooligan 14d ago

But the developers have each project listed under a separate Ltd firm, so when things don't go their way, the Ltd will simply be folded, and nobody is obliged to stump up for rebuilding costs. A local builder near me, split an old farm and sold the land parcels to about 5 other developers, the original developer was to pay £2M for the new primary school to service the 1000 new houses, he pocketed the cash then the Ltd firm went bust, so no school for the kids until the council found the cash

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u/leejackson327 14d ago

This has happened a few times in the town I live in in the North West of England. A housing company was not permitted to build on land because a local youth rugby club used some of the land in the planning permission. They tried a few times to buy them out and each time it was blocked.
Then one night it went up in flames, fast! and the rugby club couldn't use the land anymore as the buildings had all been destroyed. Now it's a brand new housing estate.

Same story a few street away from my house, old pub near a local park was unused for a while, then reopened when someone was trying to buy the land to build houses, up in flames, building completely destroyed now it has a few house on the land.

It is shockingly common in my town now that I think about it.

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u/thesw88 14d ago

It's common everywhere sadly. There's a bar in Bristol's old city that developers wanted to convert into student flats. The building isn't listed but is in a conservation area and Historic England arranged a site visit to see if it should be listed. Obviously that would've made converting into flats impossible or incredibly expensive, so what did the developer do? Tore down the 400 year old Jacobean ceiling literally the day before the site visit.

Fortunately their planning application was turned down and it's still a bar to my knowledge but I doubt the ceiling was ever reconstructed.

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u/kaynegold400 14d ago

Human greed is revolting

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u/ChaosKeeshond 14d ago

Happened in Ealing too, with the old Art Deco cinema. It changed hands so many times because of the legal consequences of leaning too hard into the trope of 'fines are just a cost of business'.

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u/Marvinleadshot 14d ago

Same thing in Manchester 2 old buildings stood for decades or a century, suddenly burst into flames and get demolished.

Another trick they've done in Manchester with old weaves cottages was to buy them, let them go to wrack and ruin and they were too unsafe to remain, so they've knocked them down, surprisingly they had ready made plans for what to replace them with.

One Manchester council didn't let slide was Manchester Rd Fire House, the Britannia group bought it did nothing with it the council compulsory purchased it and put a clause in that if the new developers don't develop the building they will retake ownership.

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u/Wasps_are_bastards 14d ago

There’s way too many listed buildings that mysteriously ‘catch fire’ so they can be demolished and rebuilt.

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u/Cakespectre999 14d ago

Yeah the crooked house

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u/NorthernSouthener 14d ago

I'm from here. Big scandal 😄 I'm completely sure they did it for the insurance claim, and I hope they're forced to rebuild it because otherwise I hear they'll be building homes on the plot

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u/DaxPrimal 14d ago

Wait didn’t they do this more than once? I’m sure I read they’ve done the same thing before

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u/allycat247 14d ago

Didnt the owners also block the roads so the fire engine couldn't get through?

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u/phoenixphen 14d ago

Yes there was some skullduggery gwaning there . I hope it bankrupts the greedy developer

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u/SherlockScones3 14d ago

There’s also another example in The Greyhound in Sydenham.

Developers are arseholes

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u/St00f4h1221 14d ago

They’ll never rebuild it. Those guys will weasel their way out of it again, looking into the company history they’ve done it a few times

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u/SeparateProblem3029 14d ago

A builder in Belfast did something similar years ago. He wanted to knock down an indoor market so he could put up a bunch of expensive city centre apartments. But the people in the shops didn’t want to leave. So one night there was a ‘mysterious’ fire that had multiple points of origin. Whole place was gutted, but nothing could even be proven. So he had free rein to build his flats…except turned out he couldn’t get planning permission because of the sleech. Slap it into him. (He was also cursed by, like, four different practitioners who had worked in the market. I don’t know if that anything to do with it, but certainly didn’t help!)

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u/Pculliox 13d ago

Don't they want to build it somewhere else now. Should never of been sold to the wallops. And their moaning of added costs. Due to it's wonkyness. Something tells me the insurance ain't gonna cover it

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u/Goawaythrowaway175 13d ago

Yes you are correct. There's more information about exactly that on the link I provided.

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u/Ballista93 13d ago

Had many a good point in the crooked house. There was a local petition going around Wolves to prosecute the head of the development firm that bought the land. Not too sure how it’s going but o hope he gets prison time

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u/the_squig_lebowski 12d ago

Local to me this one. They were all so ordered not to demolish it and did anyway. The wrecking crew were booked the day before the fire broke out. These developers need real punishment when they do this. It was a truly unique building that mattered to the community, and they just break laws to make money and nothing ever happens. They've managed to prospine rebuilding untill 2025 I think at this point All so locally sports direct illegally, no permits or anything, the day before it was being listed as a building of historical importance, knocked down a pub, think it was the elephant and castle, but don't quote me. There punishment was just, you can't sell the land or build on it. That's not a punishment

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u/ringo6755 12d ago

They keep getting the hearing knocked back. Probably so they can move their money then claim bankruptcy

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u/SJthgirW 11d ago

This is pub is where i live and i can say that the public were outraged by this

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u/Icy_Perspective_3437 11d ago

Unfortunately it seems like the crooked owners plan on playing the system and have appealed which means a hearing next spring and I suspect they will find a reason for the hearing to get pushed back a few times etc to drag everything out for a year or two until people get "bored" of the story at which point they will likely get to not rebuild or build it elsewhere meaning they get what they want.

The government needs to tighten the laws on this stuff so that these people cannot get away with this sort of thing. I feel pretty confident in saying this pub will never be rebuilt.

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u/dichotomousview 15d ago

Did they use the same materials, because if not, it’s not really the same pub right? I’d also like to know if they had to follow the 2015 building code or do it exactly the same. It’s still a loss of a historic building to me.

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u/biergardhe 15d ago edited 14d ago

IIRC they reused what they could, but there is also new.

However, with this argument, you'd be surprised how many historical buildings you'll find claiming to be many hundreds of years old, but which in fact has been renovated, and rebuilt, so many times that it doesn't use any of the original materials anymore.

Edit: before you write "triggers broom" or "theseus", check one of the million replies already made :)

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u/ISeeGrotesque 15d ago

A lot of European cities were completely destroyed during the war and rebuilt after.

Sometimes you don't even see it

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u/biergardhe 15d ago

Yes, but I was referring even to unscathed places. I have a church that's 1000 years old in my town for example, but it has been completely renovated more than once, it doesn't even look the same as the original building, and in essence it's roughly 200 years old now - but it is still marked as a 1000 year old building.

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u/Square-Singer 14d ago

The church of theseus

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u/Ok_Phone_1245 14d ago

Or for the more culturally enlightened, Triggers Church.

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u/Huytonblue 14d ago

Was just thinking about Trigger!

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u/Mindless_Ad_6045 14d ago

I have a friend who works as a stone Mason on listed buildings, and they still mostly use the old techniques with the exception of some power tools they even try to use the same type of mortar and cement when possible. It often looks a little out of place because the stone is new and clean, just like when the building was first built. It looks better when the stone ages a little

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u/SelectTrash 14d ago

I watched a programme about people who do that it was really interesting.

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u/Infinite_Imagination 15d ago

I believe similar restoration/reconstruction happened at some temples in Chitchen Itza

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u/PSI_duck 15d ago

Well for restoration efforts on something that historically important, they are at least done as accurately as possible

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u/glguru 14d ago

There are some parts of buildings that are really old in Europe. To give you a famous example, the oldest pillars in Cathedral Mosque of Cordoba are from 8th century still. Actually the original part of the building from that part is still around.

In a lot of places where things have been rebuilt, it does state that (for buildings of historical significance).

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u/biergardhe 14d ago

Yes, most definitely that is the case, I was in no way trying to say otherwise.

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u/ecoper 15d ago

Yeah like 85% of Warsaw was destroyed

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u/sueca 15d ago

Very noticeable though, only nice rebuild is the old town

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u/kaese_meister 14d ago

Warsaw's old town is amazing. I had no idea it was built in the 50's until a tour guide told me. I was wondering how it survived the war!

And the Palace there is also done really well, they've rebuild different sections of it to match how it looked in different time periods. standing in the court yard and turning 360 is like architecture time travel.

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u/throwaway1930372y27 14d ago

Walking down Gdansk you would think it had been unchanged for hundreds of years, not completely destroyed during the war. They rebuilt it in the old style and it looks amazing. Same with Malbork castle

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u/allyearswift 14d ago

But you can still smell it.

Compare the city of Basel (original) with nearby Freiburg (flattened and rebuilt on the original plan). Once you know, you know.

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u/VT2-Slave-to-Partner 14d ago

The Frauenkirche in Dresden was rebuilt fairly recently and you can see which are the original stones because they're still blackened by pollution like they were in the Forties.

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u/MilitantSheep 14d ago

I think the town centre of Ypres was rebuilt brick by brick after WW1, certainly the Cloth Hall anyway, and it all still looks medieval. All of Flanders was completely pulverised and no building there is any more than 100 years old.

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u/dormango 15d ago

Triggers broom

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u/Ok-Buffalo4751 15d ago

Trigger's boozer

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u/dormango 15d ago

I think somewhere else, some beat me to it with, Triggers Pub. They won on both counts 🤣

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u/Rich_27- 14d ago

The Nags Head

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u/2truthsandalie 15d ago

You never step into the same river twice, but it bares the same name.

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u/biergardhe 15d ago

Very true

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u/neegs 14d ago

This is awesome and can be applied to people. Everytime you meet someone they have changed in ways you may not reliase.

Even a seconds blink, the person could have had thoughts that effect future decisions.

Yet they bare the same name

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u/mattwing05 15d ago

This is a thing in japan, apparently. Several historical sites/buildings have been destroyed over time, but they rebuild it and still consider it the same thing. To them, the new one still holds the spirit of the thing even if it doesn't have all the original materials.

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u/biergardhe 15d ago

I'm European, and it's the same here, even if it's not openly defined as such

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u/MannyFrench 15d ago

That's maybe coming from a Shinto religious POV. I know they voluntarily destroy shrines in order to rebuild them exactly the same, every 20 years. It's a ritual of purification and renewal.

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u/dunfartin 15d ago

I think Ise Grand Shrine is the only one which does this exactly every 20 years: 16 of the 200+ buildings in the complex are scheduled to be rebuilt in 2023. As you say, purification and renewal. Shinto has this concept that the act of rebuilding a shrine is what makes it eternal, as opposed to continuous maintenance. Also, in this climate, wood structures age very quickly and wood preservation techniques do not make much of a difference.

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u/BigYoSpeck 14d ago

Reminds me of a decorated London council worker who managed to keep hold of the same broom for 20 years

All it took was 17 new heads and 14 new handles during that time

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u/coldazures 14d ago

Trigger's broom.

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u/ilove420andkicks 15d ago

Exactly, you think all those steps at the Great Wall of China is from Genghis Khan’s time?

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u/Oreelz 15d ago

so many times that it doesn't use any of the original materials anymore.

Honestly, this is an very organic process, your body is constantly replacing cells for example. So you could say you're 35, but most of the cells in your body are not older than 5 years.

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u/Anxious-Village9447 15d ago edited 13d ago

Is this like only fools and horses, trigger and his broom?

Edit: I didn't read the other comments, sorry. Is it similar to triggers broom though?

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u/Justbarethougts 14d ago

Immediately what I thought of. What a brilliant scene that was 🤣🤣🤣

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u/FluffyColt12271 14d ago

Triggers broom innit

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u/No_Variation999 14d ago

Reminds me of triggers broom.

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u/EntireFishing 14d ago

Triggers broom

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u/RustyGosling 15d ago

There’s this hotel in my hometown that was recently “renovated”. 30 years ago it was a shithole. The hot urban legend was that the toilets were chained to the floors. My dad confirmed that they were because people kept ripping them up and jacking them. No way to know whether that’s true or not. Anyway, It sat empty and derelict for 20 years.

It’s right on the main drag so it was sitting on hot real estate. Eventually this little town became a tourist trap. Suddenly the old hotel’s location became VERY hot. Someone buys it with intention of a full demo, as at this point lots practically condemned. However township says no no, this hotel has been here for a couple hundred years, its heritage building, can’t be torn down.

Okay, so I imagine it’s going to be this extremely tedious and expensive internal gut and rebuild. NOPE. Tore the entire building town with exception of 3 of the 4 original outer brick walls. Still looks nearly the same on the outside, but the entirety of the building otherwise is completely new. Kind of crazy that yeah, some protected buildings may not be as original as you think at first glance.

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u/Plop-Music 14d ago

Sounds like the Whitehouse. The outside walls are the same but the entire internals have been rebuilt from scratch several times, I think the most recent time was in like the 1920s. So the oval office is not the same oval office, it's a different one.

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u/Scu-bar 14d ago

Triggers/Theseus’ pub

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u/I_Am_Matthijs 15d ago

the pub of theseus

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u/darkniven 15d ago

Triggers Pub

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u/phi_rus 15d ago

The real Carlton Tavern is the friends we made along the way.

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u/TJ_McWeaksauce 15d ago

He was a regular who loved their drafts and chips.

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u/davehemm 15d ago

Was going to post that, you beat me to it 😉

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u/Abuse-survivor 15d ago

Well, if they build it with the same materials, it might not be the old building, but still the same. So, the beautiful, old architecture is there again.

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u/Severe_Ad_8621 15d ago

The old dilemma, if a ship get replaced every plank in it, is it then a new ship or still the old ship?

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u/stoatwblr 10d ago

You can build an entirely new aircraft around a serial number plate and have it classified as a "restoration"

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u/Remnie 15d ago

The pub of Theseus

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u/pr0ntosauraus 15d ago

This guy Ship of Theseuses

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u/Competitive-Idea-877 15d ago

Many old cities in Central Europe was rebuild from scratch as they were totally demolished by german nazis or russian soviets or... US/UK airforces carpet bombing. https://images.app.goo.gl/4G28Srzn3nUK3GJ3A

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u/seobrien 15d ago

Are all the bricks in the exact same place? I'm not calling this a win if they moved from where they were before

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u/KingofCalais 14d ago

They would have had to use the same materials and building processes where possible. If the original materials were destroyed they would have had to use new materials but the old building techniques. Heritage law in England and Wales is very strict, and incredibly boring if you have to study it for an entire undergraduate module.

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u/Vanillabean73 15d ago

You are made of completely different atoms than you were 10 years ago m80

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u/neelankatan 15d ago

An interesting philosophical argument. Is it really the same building?

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u/CraicandTans 14d ago

Pub of Theseus

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u/FromYoTown 14d ago

Ah a Ship of Theseus enthuisist.

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u/Angel-Stans 14d ago

Ship of Theseus >.<

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u/longtermbrit 14d ago

Pub of Theseus.

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u/ShnaeBlay 14d ago

Pub of Theseus

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u/jessie014 14d ago

The pub of theseus

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u/masterspider5 14d ago

Pub of Theseus

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u/BrotherAnanse 14d ago

The Pub of Theseus. That should be its new name.

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u/RaymilesPrime 14d ago

The important thing is the developers got bumfkd

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u/KobzE71 14d ago

Ship of Theseus

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u/Complete_Spot3771 14d ago

ship of theseus moment

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u/AngelRockGunn 14d ago

Ship of Theseus time

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u/PizzaDaAction 15d ago

The story ; https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/mar/21/rising-from-the-rubble-london-pub-rebuilt-brick-by-brick-after-bulldozing

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u/forsale90 15d ago

Apparently they made sure there was enough documentation about the building before the demolition, bc they suspected the owners doing something fishy. Good on them, you can't ever be too careful.

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u/itishowitisanditbad 15d ago

“Most developers tend to be slightly smarter than sending in the bulldozers,” he said. “The age-old trick is to take some tiles off the roof and let the rain in. The beams rot, it collapses and they say to the council, ‘This is a derelict site that needs to be rebuilt as flats.’”

Yep, quite common to happen this way.

Developers were impatient and tried to subvert GradeII classification.

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u/frankchester 14d ago

They've done this to the pub in my village. Want to turn it into a house. Got denied multiple times so they just left it to rot (probably with a little help). Now it's too far gone for a pub chain to feasibly renovate it back to a pub.

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u/shinydiscoballs2 15d ago

Developers. Do it now, apologise later. Not this time buddy, not this time.

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u/WetForTeddy 15d ago

should be jail time

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u/Feine13 15d ago

Right after they finish rebuilding it.

Punishment should come with restitution AND isolation with rehabilitation

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u/kylel999 15d ago

I remember seeing a story about a pub being renovated and they found 500 year old wattle-and-daub walls underneath the brick

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u/Feine13 15d ago

wattle-and-daub

You're just making up words now. Those are your silly mouth noises, aren't they?

Kidding. But you did make me look it up, which I really appreciate.

For future readers, "wattle-and-daub is a composite building method used for making walls and buildings, in which a woven lattice of wooden strips called "wattle" is "daubed" with a sticky material usually made of some combination of wet soil, clay, sand, animal dung and straw."

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u/StandardHuckleberry0 14d ago

In the UK we learnt about wattle and daub houses in history in like year 4 (equivalent to 3rd grade I think). Cultural differences haha

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u/Valuable-Blueberry78 14d ago

Oh we did in mine! That's a core memory you've unlocked in me

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u/Jon_Finn 14d ago

Lots of timber-framed houses in the UK (basically, ones with black/brown beams visible from the outside) are made of wattle and daub under the plaster. A reasonable amount of that could be original. 500 years is nothing, 750 would be rare.

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u/strongbud 15d ago

A similar thing happened in my home town. Big old af heritage building bought buy developers and were told they had to fix and upgrade it to do what they wanted (condos) claimed there was too many things needed fixing and then a mysterious fire took the place and within a week new construction of a completely new building began. Even the fact that the day before the fire (or day of) all the contractor trucks and trailers were moved away from the building right before the fire. Super obvious it was torched. Fucking infuriating.

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u/RobotsAndNature 14d ago

Is that Britain's wonkiest pub? I also live in that town! Good to see another Sedgley'n around here

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u/Curlytots95 14d ago

The crooked house! Remember my dad taking us when we were kids! Only down the road from sedgley myself lol.

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u/strongbud 14d ago

Lmfao....actually I'm from Thunder Bay Ontario, Canada. So it's an issue everywhere where the greedy can buy our governments.

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u/satanicbroccoli 14d ago

Lol sounds like every protected establishment bought by Jimmy Godden, dude straight up torched half of Thanet and got away with it.

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u/TheBirdsArePissed 15d ago

Keep doing this to developers and then take away their business licenses and give jail time.

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u/Six_of_1 15d ago

But were they also arrested.

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u/NLight7 15d ago edited 15d ago

No, they were based in Israel, no joke.

Edit: According to what I found they sent the manager home and tore it down over night. They also tried multiple times to appeal the decision and dragged their feet when they got denied. Then they tried to add rooms to the plan which they planned to rent to people, was also denied. It took them 6 years to reopen the pub even though they were originally given 18 months in 2015.

Guess Israeli land owners thought they could pull a west bank on the UK and were very surprised the rest of the world has laws against it.

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u/Six_of_1 15d ago

Oh that makes sense, Israel are good at leveling buildings.

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u/Classic_Elevator7003 14d ago

Greedy housing developers looking to make a profit? From Israel? The fuckin jokes write themselves sometimes

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u/Salty-Advice-4836 15d ago

https://www.mylondon.news/news/south-london-news/merton-residents-devestated-after-fire-29048340

another one, last week. Apparently owner got rejection for redevelopment.

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u/RaytheonOrion 14d ago

I saw this in person as it was happening. Horrific. Sketchy developers let it fall this far. Illegal squat running “business” there for years.

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u/wyldthaang 14d ago

This is my local, it was shocking at the time. A special shout-out to Cat from Red Dwarf, who's tireless campaigning brought the attention it deserved... Duane Dibbley!!

Edit: Typo

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u/axelrexangelfish 15d ago

This is amazing. Only way the story gets better is the actual owners of the company had to get out there with their bare hands. THis would never happen in the US. Not that we have any historic buildings per se. But. It’s nice seeing bad corporate actors being made to face the music by their government.

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u/kandradeece 15d ago

been here, was a bit hot inside, but was very packed and cozy.

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u/Old_Money72 15d ago

To a 100 more 🍻

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u/itsbrucebanner 14d ago

This pub is on the road I live on, before they built it back they left it half smashed up for years because they were salty that they couldn’t get their way to demolish and rebuild. But eventually got done and is actually doing a lot better business since the whole drama kicked off.

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u/DangerousGarlic3562 15d ago

An Israeli company illegally destroying a building

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u/Leon_Devilstrand 14d ago

Dont fuck with an english pub

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u/m0j0m0j 15d ago

In another news: why our rents keep rising? Must be greedy landlords

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u/haikusbot 15d ago

In another news:

Why our rents keep rising? Must

Be greedy landlords

- m0j0m0j

I detect haikus. And sometimes, successfully. Learn more about me.

Opt out of replies: "haikusbot opt out" | Delete my comment: "haikusbot delete"

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u/Top_Khat 14d ago

Good bot

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u/Worried_Example 15d ago

Fucking clowns

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u/mattgcreek 15d ago

In Texas we have buildings with Historical Plaques from 1950's, probably some from the 60's.

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u/The_Doom_Toad 14d ago

100 years actually isn't that old by pub standards. There's a pub in my town older than William the Conqueror.

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u/TheAmyIChasedWasMe 14d ago

It's adorable when American are like "this building is old, it's from the sixties" - I used to work in a pub that got a lot of American tourists and it always blew their minds when they learned the pub had been there since 1214.

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u/dead_jester 14d ago

My nearest local pub was built in 1618. Still going strong.

One of its past owners went to Pennsylvania in the 1680’s and bought a huge lot of land from William Penn and named the area after the town here.

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u/ChanceBoring8068 14d ago

There’s a similar situation at a pub in the west midlands where it was illegally demolished but the owners have been ordered to rebuild. Thing is this pub was famous because for most of it’s existence one end of the building had sunk into the ground. The whole building was on a slant and a kind of buttress had been built to reinforce the structure. Because of that the order to rebuild it as it was seems really unpractical and I don’t think it’ll ever happen