The Fellowship Inn — Restaurant in London

🚇Bellingham 🍺 £5.40 Pravha

The Fellowship Inn is located on the edge of the Bellingham Estate, at the southern end of Catford in Southeast London. The nearest station is Bellingham which is situated to the right of the pub.

The pub was built in 1924. It was the first pub to be constructed on a London housing estate, as part of developments aimed at easing inner-city overcrowding after the First World War.

In the late 1960s, the pub became a buzzing music venue, hosting acts such as Fleetwood Mac and Eric Clapton. It was also the training base of local heavyweight boxer Henry Cooper in the lead-up to his 1963 fight with Muhammad Ali.

The décor here is absolutely outstanding and is one of the finest examples of any interwar-built pub in London. Everywhere you look, you’ll find original features and design elements from the 1920s. There are two bars, divided by a stunning panelled partition. The centrally located servery spans both bars.

The décor includes wood-panelled walls, parquet flooring, Tudor-arched fireplaces, unique Art Deco booths, and boxing gloves and photos of ‘Our ’Enry’. Traditional pub features are also present, such as a pool table and a dartboard. The pub also boasts a large lounge at the rear, a café, and—remarkably—an 85-seat Art Deco cinema in the basement, which you can hire to play your DVDs.

The beer lineup offers a selection of familiar favourites, independent brews, and one cask ale. I kept it simple and opted for a Pravha — my pint was great, and the price was just over a fiver. The food menu features classic British pub grub and a range of burgers. Fish & Chips is priced at £16.

We arrived just after 1 p.m. on a warm and sunny Saturday afternoon in May. The pub was fairly quiet inside, with a few punters sitting outside, soaking up the spring sunshine. The atmosphere was chilled and relaxed, with a nice local feel around the pub.

The service here is first-class — the team on duty are friendly and chatty. I was lucky enough to get a guided tour of the pub from the duty manager, Nadine, who is clearly passionate about this place.

Wow, I was absolutely blown away by this truly unique and rare, virtually unaltered, example of a 1920s public house. I can’t recommend a visit highly enough, this is a must visit London pub.

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📅 10th May 2025

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A disappointing first visit since reopening… They had run out of Pino Grigio by 5pm on a Saturday, alongside some of the beers.

The menu served did not match the website and was limited to Jerk Chicken in a range of forms. Some veggie stuff too, but still not a great selection. This needs changing, as it is very uninspiring. Literally no children’s menu at all and my kids very much dislike Jerk. This seems like a huge error as it’ll be parents eating with kids that’ll keep the place open. The food tasted good, but was lukewarm.

The staff were still learning to use the till and there was an annoying fire alarm beep that keep going off. The manager seemed more interested in what was going on on his laptop, over what was happening in his bar…

Tables were not wiped after people left and there seems no system to manage people eating yet (forgot to offer cutlery etc.). It all felt very disorganised.

I REALLY want this place to survive. But if they don’t improve the management and attention to detail, I fear it’ll die quite a rapid death.

I’m not going to rush back now after that first experience, but I hope when I do, that things are of a higher standard. It’d be such a shame if they blow this opportunity to get this great pub...

The venue is amazing and quite large. It's got some normal tables and chairs but also booths for 6-8. There is 2 function rooms and downstairs a cinema, yes a cinema in a pub!! Brilliant.

The only thing that let it down was the very, very limited selection of spirits, infact they said they didn't have any? However did have a decent selection of local craft beers. The white wines were awful. And in my opinion not great if you can't provide spirits.

The smaller function room with a bar in according to the bar man only had one choice of drink which was a beer, that was all. And they didn't seem interested in helping anyone with any of their drink requests, odd for a pub.

The menu looked ok with an ok selection especially if you wanted it flavored in Jerk flavor.

I'm presuming it doesn't get hugely busy or it would have a better selection of alcohol, however if you wanted to hire it to have a largish function or show a film for a kino club it would be incredible.

The staff were nice but a touch slow and not really into being top notch service but the landlord was friendly and I had a good chat with him and he was amenable.

This venue needs more booze and bigger nights and it would be...