IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Downham Way, BROMLEY, BR1 5HN

The fact that this Victorian postbox is a large one suggests that it is outside the former location of Grove Park Post Office. The current office is a short distance up, on the other side of the road, with no box outside.

This imposing building, built in 1882, stands on the corner of Baring Road and Downham Way, facing the entrance to Grove Park Station and represents a bucking of the trend of pub closures in recent years. Closed thanks to a firebomb attack in 2009, in 2011 it was due to be demolished and replaced with shops and flats, causing something of an outcry locally. It was granted a local listing by Lewisham's mayor and, eventually, in December 2013 it has reopened as a pub. Internally, it is clear that further work is necessary and imminent - certain parts are cordoned off rather crudely, for example, and much of the walls show signs of fire damage, a reminder of the reason it closed. It has a wide range of both pumped and bottled real ales, a cosy dark atmosphere, and some lovely pork pies as accompanying snacks! See Image for Mike Quinn's photo showing its rather sorry state in September 2010, and http://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/10910825.Grove_Park_Baring_Hall_Hotel_pub_reopens_after_community_saves_it_from_demolition/?ref=rss for more on the story of its reopening.

A fine Victorian establishment which faced a very uncertain future a few years ago following an arson attack. Image Image A lot on the web about it, but I didn't find what or where the original Baring Hall was.

Comparison shot from 2011: http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/2523310 This pub reopened in 2013.

A pub called the Baring Hall Hotel is on the left.

Only 18 months after it was photographed still open Image, the hotel had shut.

When I wrote the description on Image, I mentioned that the fire damage, from the firebomb which closed the pub in 2009, had not yet been repaired. That was in February 2014, a couple of months after the pub had reopened. Now, four years on, it is clear that the charred beams and other smoke damage has been retained as a kind of feature of the place, giving it a slightly dark, rather otherworldly atmosphere which is actually quite wonderful. We are looking diagonally towards the bar, in the main part of the building, from the conservatory-like addition to the west. The beams out of picture towards the top of the sloping roof above us actually give a more obviously burnt impression, but the little window-like screen partly filling the archway has very evident smoke damage. The wall in the gents' toilet is also rather bizarre in that it has old stonework crudely criss-crossed by more modern timberwork. The rest of the building, which I mentioned in the linked photo above, has now opened and it is a lovely convivival place which I look forward to when I visit friends in this area.