Pubs and Bars / Pub of the Week
Pub of the Week: Industry Bar & Kitchen
Occupying a slim shopfront on Gloucester Road, it’s possible to stroll right past Industry without realising it’s there.
The two brothers who own it have done what they can: bright lights burn night and day outside, ringing a very hip chipboard sign like an A-lister’s mirror, but there’s more to making somewhere memorable than its choice in lightbulbs.
A narrow bar area in what was previously Halo offers just two tables in the window, with some tall metal stools to perch at along the walls and at the bar itself, with space is left open for mingling and dancing the night away at the weekends.
On recent evening, a couple of lads propped up the bar, their loud conversation bouncing off the wooden floor. The only other people inside were a small group of middle-aged women sitting in the window, perusing the menu with a Prosecco in hand.
The bar itself reflects the industrial theme, with a rusting metal surround and a shiny polished stainless steel top – everything looks reclaimed from previous purposes.
There’s a good selection of drinks on offer, with beers on tap, bottles in the fridge and spirits lining the back of the bar. The only sign on the thoroughly uncluttered bar top informs of cocktails on offer from £5.95, with a choice of six different gins for the G&T.
Close your eyes, turn around three times and be guaranteed to pin the tail on something achingly trendy
The back of the bar opens out into a large room, where the industrial theme continues, unbridled. One wall is papered with mock embossed metal, while elsewhere there is (tick them off): exposed brickwork, copper piping snaking from dark grey radiators mounted to the wall like art pieces, and a couple of wall-mounted lamps made from repurposed metal jerry cans. Ten bonus points for rust.
Some of the sofas are backed with old floorboards, there are low tables made of scaffold poles, and the tall tables are the insides of huge rolls of cable, turned on their sides like massive cotton bobbins.
If you closed your eyes and turned around three times, you’d be guaranteed to pin the tail on something achingly trendy.
At odds with the wipe clean dancefloor, covered smoking area and low volume pop bangers on the sound system is the menu. Industry bills itself as a bar and kitchen, and the kitchen certainly seems willing to try some interesting dishes with locally-sourced ingredients.
A choice ranges from burgers (starting from £8.95) to the more exotic hot smoked pork loin (£12.95) via some inventive vegetarian choices including chargrilled aubergine (£9.95) and a braised fennel risotto (£8.95).
Stroll right past and miss Industry entirely. Or step inside and this bar is so generic and uninspired that you could be absolutely anywhere.
Industry Bar & Kitchen, 141 Gloucester Road, BS7 8BA
0117 942 2735
www.industrybarandkitchen.co.uk
Read more: Pub of the Week – Cider Press
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