Camden Brewdog at 13: what a long strange trip it’s been
When exactly Camden Brewdog opened to the public doesn’t seem totally clear-it was around now 13 years ago. However it had a soft launch thirteen years ago today(it was a Saturday) and I was certainly there, as were James Watt and Martin Dickie in a tank. Indeed Brewdog’s penchant for publicity has a long history.
I wrote something on the 5th anniversary but at 13 years a greater perspective can be gathered
It was the fourth Brewdog bar to open and the first outside of Scotland, hence the opening was something of a landmark at the time. The pub itself is not a huge- a ground floor and lower ground- a far cry from some of Brewdog’s more recent openings.
At the time Brewdog still produced cask beer (it was soon to stop) so a talking point 13 years ago was that there was no cask, it was all keg. This is hardly remarkable in 2024 but then it was at best rare.
I haven’t been in Camden Brewdog for quite a while- after all there are many more convenient craft beer bars now. In fact I haven’t been in a Brewdog bar at all in 2024 because of the employment and cultural issues at the brewer that still seem to me unresolved. In 2013 this would I think have surprised us, even if we were no fans of James Watts’ style.
The pub, well before it was a Brewdog, also featured in the never ending inquiry into police infiltration into left and radical campaigns. It was a meeting place for the Camden left in the late 1960s and hence undercover police officers were also to be found at the bar.
One wonders where matters will be in another 13 years.
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