London Pubs Group

Campaign for Real Ale

Campaign for Real Ale

Great Exhibition

193 Crystal Palace Road
East Dulwich
SE22 9EP

This pub is not a listed building, but it is on the Campaign for Real Ale’s (CAMRA) Local Inventory as having an interior of Local Historic Interest, and the description is as follows:

"Built circa 1880, there is an elaborately detailed vestibule entrance with two doors that once led to two separate room.

Whilst opened-up (four doors indicate it probably had four room) it still retains some quality late Victorian fittings. However it is impossible to discern the original layout from what we see today following a refurbishment from around 2010 that completely changed everything. Prior to this there was a central servery leading directly from the vestibule entrance with separate counters to the lounge bar on the left and public bar on the right, and these counters have almost certainly been dissected to produce the current bar counter at the back of the room. The present three bay bar-back has been created by moving the superb cut and etched convex curved mirror from the pre-2010 bar-back; the delightful etched panels either side of it, featuring birds and flowers; and the wooden surrounds with capitalled pilasters may also have been resited from the original bar-back.

The elaborate doorway framing the door to the gents to the left of the current servery, with two columns with capitals picked out in gold paint, and with narrow vertical etched mirrors either side of them, previously framed the door to the erstwhile publican's office to the rear of the previous servery.

There are also two large supporting pillars near the front of the room, with their capitals also gold-painted of course. The vestibule entrance has carved wooden projections above each of the doors to the left and right including etched glass panels, but these may also have been resited. There's an ornate wooden cornice above the centre section of the vestibule with narrow mirrored panels below it, and below that a relatively modern Taylor Walker glazed panel.

The WhatPub link is here: WhatPub/Great Exhibition

The Great Exhibition (then the Crystal Palace Tavern) featured on the Daytime Crawl of Herne Hill, Dulwich and Sydenham in February 2004.