A While ago we had a sister pub called the Camel & Artichoke in South London – 121 Lower Marsh SE1
It used to be part of Antipodean Sports Bar Group. They had three pubs in London all called The Camel. When we bought the pub in 2005 however, we weren’t allowed to continue with this name.
As it used to be called The Artichoke it was decided to call it that. But in a discussion the two names kind of got joined – so The Camel & Artichoke was Born.
A very handy maintenance man called Jaffa (Ginger hair – in his youth) saw a fibreglass Camel in a junk yard. We decided to buy it and use it as a feature for the pub.
We painted it Gold and managed to get it on a two-story roof at the back of the Pub overlooking Waterloo Station.
It was positioned there for about a month and a then out of the blue a Policeman came a calling. ‘That there Camel on your roof has been reported as previously stolen’
So he went up to check it out
Low and behold an identifying chip on its ear (not an electronic one) identified it as the said stolen Camel
We were distraught. 😢
Luckily as we had bought it in good faith (and had the receipt) and the junkyard had also bought it in good faith, we were all spared jail time – however we had to ‘allow’ the correct owner to collect it if they so desired.
Luckily, they weren’t too keen on getting it off the roof and into a van so they desired it not
We were happy again. 🤗
In 2016 our Lease was due to expire, and the Landlord did not renew it, as they had decided to rip the heart out of the pub by removing the upper bar and trade kitchen and converting the top three stories into private flats to sweat the asset a bit more. That was their right as Landlords but it meant the destruction of the fabric and history of a great pub. Thankfully councils are now stopping this social vandalism.
Now the architect that drew up the conversion plans also included our Camel in the drawings. Mildly enraged by this act we thought – ‘They can take our pub but not our Camel’ - We have been through too much together
So, we put it in a van and brought it to The Skinners Arms on our moving out day and hoiked it up onto our garage roof –
And that good people’s is why we have a Camel on our garage roof