Bars & Pubs

White Hart

Popular with employees from South Bank media offices, this bustling corner pub has big windows looking onto the short cut to Waterloo station. As well as several wheat...

Waterloo: 29-30 Cornwall Road, SE1 8TJ

Distance: 0.2 mls

King's Arms

On one of central London’s last remaining terraces of Victorian workers’ cottages, this corner pub is now firmly on the tourist map, but also remains a firm...

Waterloo: 25 Roupell Street, SE1 8TB

Distance: 0.3 mls

Black Friar

This curiously wedge-shaped pub at the north end of Blackfriars Bridge lures significant numbers of people away from their desks at 6pm - particularly in summer, when...

City: 174 Queen Victoria Street, EC4V 4EG

Distance: 0.3 mls

El Vino

City: 30 New Bridge Street, EC4V 6BJ

Distance: 0.3 mls

The Anchor & Hope

Waterloo's most famous gastropub remains a good place for a drink, though dining is certainly the main event, and it can become impossibly busy. Nibbles such as polish...

Waterloo: 36 The Cut, SE1 8LP

Distance: 0.3 mls

Edgar Wallace

His bust sitting attentively on the bar counter, the pre-war penman would have appreciated this neat, well-run pub serving handpump ales and decent wines to a mainly...

Aldwych: 40 Essex Street, WC2R 3JE

Distance: 0.4 mls

Hole in the Wall

Better than an ATM, the HITW is an unreconstructed drinking hole in 'the wall' of the old South Eastern Railway's line into Charing Cross. In a calculated snub to the...

Waterloo: 5 Mepham Street, SE1 8SQ

Distance: 0.4 mls

Baltic

An unlikely find on Blackfriars Road, the Baltic is sleek, chic and discreet. The exceptional north-east European restaurant is a bright and airy Grade II-listed...

Waterloo: 74 Blackfriars Road, SE1 8HA

Distance: 0.4 mls

El Vino

The ultimate old-fashioned wine bar, in the heart of London legal land. Many a barrister finds a way here from the Courts of Justice opposite, and you’ll hear plenty...

City: 47 Fleet Street, EC4Y 1BJ

Distance: 0.4 mls

Waterloo Brasserie

Like a true brasserie, this one is open all day, covering breakfast, supper and everything in between. Segregated bar and restaurant areas have a self-consciously...

Waterloo: 119 Waterloo Road, SE1 8UL

Distance: 0.4 mls

Concrete

Thank the Lord. Starbucks has gone and in its place is a classy little bar/café with the tongue-in-cheek name of Concrete (set, as it is, in the vast Brutalist...

Waterloo: The Hayward, Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, SE1 8XX

Distance: 0.4 mls

Skylon

There can't be many better transport views than this in all of London. Sit at the cocktail bar (in between the two restaurant areas), and gaze out of what seems like a...

Waterloo: Royal Festival Hall, Belvedere Road, SE1 8XX

Distance: 0.4 mls

Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese

If you were to put a branch of All Bar One at one end of the drinking den spectrum, you'd find this pub leering at it with yellowing teeth from the other. Gloriously...

Fleet Street: 145 Fleet Street, EC4A 2BU

Distance: 0.4 mls

Fire Station

The London County Council's grand Edwardian fire station on Waterloo Road was converted into one of the city's early gastrobars in the 1990s. The restaurant's in the...

Waterloo: 150 Waterloo Road, SE1 8SB

Distance: 0.4 mls

Lord Nelson

A drab 1950s council estate façade hides one of the funkiest little pubs in south London. Kitsch and cosy thanks to a wall-length beach theme, the Nelson's decor also...

London Bridge: 243 Union Street, SE1 0LR

Distance: 0.4 mls

Charles Dickens

You would have to know it's here, this unprepossessing freehouse by the mainline rails heading out from London Bridge station, but regulars can always be found as you...

London Bridge: 160 Union Street, SE1 0LH

Distance: 0.5 mls

Wine Theatre

Disappointing wine bar

Bermondsey: 202-206 Union St, SE1 0LH

Distance: 0.5 mls

Apostle (branch of Jamies)

City: 34 Ludgate Hill, EC4M 7DE

Distance: 0.5 mls

Davy's at Creed Lane

Although this chain of wine bars was launched in the 1960s, many of its sites look as old as the founding date of Davy’s wine merchants: 1870. Now owned by the fifth...

City: 10 Creed Lane, EC4M 8SH

Distance: 0.5 mls

Crown

A thoroughly successful pub renovation, the Crown is worth the walk down bleak Blackfriars Road. Often less crowded than nearby locals, it's a comfortable, vaguely...

Waterloo: 108 Blackfriars Road, SE1 8HW

Distance: 0.5 mls

Seven Stars

The TV career of landlady Roxy Beaujolais may have stuttered, but her flagship pub goes from strength to strength. People pile down here on weekday evenings, knowing...

Holborn: 53 Carey Street, WC2A 2JB

Distance: 0.5 mls

Last (branch of Balls Brothers)

City: 73 Shoe Lane, EC4A 3BQ

Distance: 0.5 mls

Mustard Bar & Lounge

The sleek, black interior of this swish City bar - all sweeping banquettes, beaded curtains and globe lights - conjures up images of '60s sci-fi classic Barbarella....

City: 2 Old Change Court, Peter's Hill, EC4M 8EN

Distance: 0.5 mls

CellarDoor

Public convenience turned public bar

Covent Garden: Zero Aldwych, WC2E 7DN

Distance: 0.6 mls

Christopher's Martini Bar

Christopher's rightly calls itself the American Bar, not only because the original at the nearby Savoy is closed for refurbishment, but because the quality of its...

Covent Garden: 18 Wellington Street, WC2E 7DD

Distance: 0.6 mls

Wine Tun (branch of Davy's)

City: 2-6 Cannon Street, EC4M 6XX

Distance: 0.6 mls

White Swan Pub & Dining Room

The Martin Brothers have done a bang-up job of refurbishing the former Mucky Duck pub: wood sides and bottom, intricately carved settle, a mirror so vast half of it...

City: 108 Fetter Lane, EC4A 1EP

Distance: 0.6 mls

George IV

Set on an unassuming, traffic-free junction of three streets, the spruce George IV attracts orderly students and staff from the London School of Economics opposite....

Aldwych: 26-28 Portugal Street, WC2A 2HE

Distance: 0.6 mls

Jamies

City: 1 Fleet Place, EC4M 7RA

Distance: 0.6 mls