#173 The Vaults, Knowle, West Midlands : 1999 to 2014

This is going to be a short post about a pub that I've only been into once...and I don't remember what it was like inside!

We don't visit Knowle very often on the canal and when we do go there we end up in any/all of the other pubs. Our first (and so far, only) visit was on the evening of Sunday 4th April 1999. It was Easter Sunday and we'd finished our regular Easter trip to Stratford and back. So, rather than drink locally in Lapworth we caught a taxi to Knowle to see what the village had to offer.

Although it has a High Street address, the entrance is on one of the side streets (next door to Loch Fyne restaurant). We must have had a pint in there because in those days I didn't take pictures if we didn't go in, but I have no recollection.

We were once again in Knowle on the evening of Sunday 28th September 2014 and, as we were strolling along the High Street, I took this picture.

To be honest, I wasn't sure if it would still be there, but it appears to have gone from strength to strength. (I discovered, whilst researching this entry, that it has been the Solihull CAMRA Pub of the Year nine times since 1992, most recently in 2013!)

The Vaults now advertises itself as a 'Real Ale Bar' that seems to have filled a niche in the area. Despite the major changes to the outside it is interesting to see that the hanging sign is still the same...even if it has been turned around in the intervening 15 years!

#169 The Red Lion, Knowle, West Midlands : 1996 to 2014

Although Knowle is only a few miles from Lapworth where our boat was moored for many years, we very rarely visit the village by boat. This is mainly because it is on a different canal (Grand Union) and the journey from there into Birmingham is far less attractive than the North Stratford Canal route.

In the days before I took a picture of every pub we visited we'd been to the Red Lion, but the first occasion I have a picture was from the evening of Sunday 7th April 1996.

Back then it had been renamed Felons & Firkin, but you can just make out that the red lion hanging sign is still there. This visit to Knowle came at the end of our first Easter trip to Stratford-upon-Avon as we had some time to kill on the way back to our moorings.

Our next visit was on the evening of Friday 31st May 2002 as the last stop on our one week trip to Banbury and back.

By this time it had reverted back to its original name and was now part of the Ember Inns chain of M&B.

It was quite a long while before we returned, this time on the evening of Sunday 28th September 2014.

This time it was at the start of a journey that started at Napton Junction and we visited Knowle before heading off to Stratford-upon-Avon. It is still part of the Ember Inns chain, but with an added 'The' to its name.

From the outside, very little has changed and I'm pleased to say that it has retained the quite magnificent hanging sign which I took a picture of a few days ago.

Inside, well that's a different matter. Back in 1996 it was a typical Firkin pub, then in 2002 it was a typical Ember Inn of that era - a cross between a pub and a wine bar - and in 2014 it was still typically an Ember Inn, but now a hybrid of a pub and a restaurant.