THE NORTH STARNorth RoadAfter the Taff Vale Railway (TVR) sliced through the countryside in 1841, the half-anglicised nonsense word ‘Maindy’ usurped Llystalybont and Blackweir as an alternative name for the …

BALLIE BALLERSONBrewery QuarterThankfully this branch of a London-based chain lasted a mere 12 months before going into administration in 2024. To Cardiff’s credit, there wasn’t enough demand for its myriad …

THE NEW FLEURSPortmanmoor RoadI don’t usually include clubs in Pubocalypse, but I will make an exception for the Fleurs in Splott. An integral part of working-class Splott’s culture and social …

CAMEOWellfield RoadOpened in 2015 in the old Halcyon Daze shop, this Roath off-shoot of the members-only Cameo Club in Pontcanna was accessible to all (if you could afford it), unlike …

33 WINDSOR PLACEWindsor PlaceAn 1850 townhouse, used as offices for many years, was converted into the calculatedly posh Bar Essential by Brains in 1998 and all the corny trappings of …

BUB’SChurch StreetThis effort from the Crafty Devil microbrewery didn’t even last four years, as I predicted with uncanny accuracy in Pubocalypse 7. Guess what? There’s no place for small independents …

CALLAGHANS Castle StreetThe plug-ugly Crest Hotel (later Posthouse, currently Holiday Inn) was built on the northern flank of the Arms Park in 1971. The dreadful development eradicated a leafy public …

Pandemic fall-out is likely to mean that a lot of the pubs ‘temporarily’ closed during lockdown will never open again. The random, spontaneous social mixing intrinsic to a public house …

BUFFALO BARWindsor PlaceIn Cardiff’s dysfunctional, parasitic economy, predicated on personal debt, profligate unsustainability, Ponzi-scheme profiteering and fly-by-night transience, the last few defiant flickers of independent nonconformity are being snuffed out …

Because the Pubocalypse strand has grown into a large archive, I’ve now made it into a category in its own right – saving me the hassle of providing links to …