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White Swan

(formerly O'Neill's)

14 New Row
Covent Garden
London
WC2N 4LF

• (020) 3077 1129
• Send an email to the Pub
• nicholsonspubs.co.uk/restaurants/london/...

Social Links

• Visit White Swan on Facebook
• Follow @WhiteSwanCG on Twitter

Opening Times

Meal Times

12 - 10

Owner

Nicholson's (Mitchells & Butlers)

About the Pub

Grade II listed building dating back to the 17th century, once a coaching house and mentioned by the diarist Samuel Pepys. An Irish-theme bar for many years, the pub was thoroughly refurbished and partly re-fitted as a traditional pub by Nicholson's, opening in May 2012. There is now a light and airy 1st floor restaurant with table service, and the ground floor bar has been considerably lightened and improved compared with the old Mucky Duck - a dark traditional market pub. It does get busy, as does any pub in Covent Garden, and the background music is a little overpowering at times. TVs show muted rolling news. It is said that Dorothy L Sayers featured the White Swan in her 1933 Lord Peter Wimsey mystery 'Murder Must Advertise'. A keen reader (chapter XII 'Surprising Acquisition of a Junior Reporter' should you wish to check) would follow in the footsteps of the said reporter from the office of the Morning Star and Evening Comet, no longer finding a 3 a.m. breakfast of grilled sausage, coffee and rolls in Fleet Street, and be surprised to find any pub in Covent Garden open at 4.15 am. The days of the Market are long gone, along with the early morning hours for the market porters, but this particular novelised pub is more likely to have been the White Lion in James Street. Sayers' characters favour Guinness (one florid person in evening dress insisting on a double Scotch and not too much bloody soda) for the most part and no comment is offered on the ale on sale. The White Swan was formerly a Hoare and Co. house, controlled by the bankers of Fleet Street, of the Red Lion Brewery with a reputation for stout and sparkling ales in Lower Smithfield, that closed in 1934, and there's a magnificent mirror with their name at the entrance.

In January 2020 a 2 week refurb was done.

Regular cask ales

This pub serves 3 regular beers.

• Fuller's London Pride
• Sharp's Doom Bar
• St Austell Nicholson's Pale Ale

Changing cask ales

This pub serves 5 changing beers.

Source: National

Updated on 01/03/2020
Last surveyed on 04/02/2020
Branch responsible is West London

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