The Harcourt pub/restaurant came to our notice as it gets consistently good reviews for it’s food (The Telegraph, Times, Timeout & GQ). But what about their access and disabled facilities? Located in London’s resurrected Marylebone (see our previous review), it’s in an old pub on different levels. Hence, only the ground floor is accessible and the toilets are downstairs – no disabled toilet. However, we looked at the 3D tour and there’s a step and less than level access at the entrance even though we were told it’s ‘accessible for wheelchairs’. This didn’t put us off and visited anyway.
It’s an old pub with wood panelling and wood floors spread across 5 rooms. They say it ’embraces the Scandinavian history associated with the grade-two-listed building’. This is obviously their excuse for no modern disabled facilities! It serves dishes of oysters, gravadlax and reindeer as well as chargrilled steak. The drinks look really interesting including ‘gin’s Nordic cousin akvavit’ and some ‘old and rare’ whiskey. At the weekend there’s a Fika menu (aka ‘coffee break’ menu, which appears to have more snacks & sandwiches). So what did the critics say?….
Grace Dent from the Standard only gave The Harcourt 2 stars but Giles Coren in The Times thought it was good and the desserts “exemplary” (apple crumble) and titled his review ‘Never read restaurant critics,’ …….‘They’re all idiots and know nothing about anything’, we assume referring to Dent’s review.
The definitive answer on access came from our visit in January. Here are our Findings:
Following a successful visit we can confirm this pub definitely has good food and style. The Ox Cheeks on mash were delicious as were the Scandinavian style fish staters – a tartare of Sea Bream with soy and chilli. The wine list is interesting and worth a try. It’s definitely got some old world, Grade II Listed, charm with original wood panels and flooring. To make it even more interesting there’s modern art on the walls – Blondie watched over us as we had lunch!! However there are problems with access if you’re disabled :
There’s a medium size step (4″ apx.) from the street and a narrow entrance but I did get my wheelchair through successfully.
There are access issues as you can see from the photos below, but don’t let that put you off as it’s worth a visit if only to see the art.
We forgave the Harcourt’s imperfections in accessibility as we had a great lunch and the atmosphere was friendly and accomodating as far as they could without a disabled toilet. They get 1.5 out of 3 BBS Ticks for style and basic accessibility.
