In Britain we have a load of royal named things, e.g “The King’s Head,” “The Prince Henry,” or animal themed pubs like “The Three Pikes,” The Red Lion (most common oub name) or something gorey like “The Hanged Man,” “The Village Chopping Block.” On that note, we also have pubs named after landmarks, e.g “The Old Oak,” “The Anvil.”
Any more modern establishment like a bar can have posher or more postmodern names. Sometimes jokey names.
I was struck by a realisation thst i don’t know how other countries name their pubs amd bars. Would be helpful to know, for understanding other cultures. I even don’t know for places like the USA, which also speak English. Excited to hear your responses!
T.G.I. Fridays
Ruby Tuesday
Applebee’s
Hooters
…we don’t have a great selection where I am in the South.
The reason most of our pubs are named like that is because when pubs first became a thing most people couldn’t read, so instead they’d paint a picture on a sign outside to make it easier to direct people to the pub if they asked. They were also just regular houses that had spare beer that they’d sell to the public and wouldn’t always be selling anything, that’s why they were called public houses originally too.
I didn’t think about them being actual public houses until now. Strategy games have lead me astray - you always build a dedicated tavern building in those. I suppose now i understand the distinction between a tavern and a pub, at long last.
Additionally, a lot of them borrowed from heraldry or livery, hence the popularity of the Red Lion, the White Hart, the Crown, the Kings Arms, etc.
In the US the names are all over the place.
I live on the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland so most of the “bars” on the bay have nautical names.
- The Rumor Reel
- The Hard Yacht Cafe
- Wicked Tuna
- LunaSeas
- Dock of the Bay
- Sunset Cove
I live in an ex-industrial british city, some we have are:
- The Anvil
- The Forge
- The Foundry (there’s a church, nightclub, and a climbing centre called this as well. It gets confusing)
- The Grindstone (formerly ye olde grindestone)
- The Bessemer (a steel process patented here)
(US) They vary wildly even in the same city. A lot of times, smaller dive bars will just be “[Name]'s Bar” or “[Name’s] Bar 2” if they have more than one. Reason for the numbering, as was explained to me, is that allows them to operate under the same liquor license.
Then you get the punny named ones like “The Pour House” or “Keglers”. Some are based on a gimmick like “The Fish Bowl” where you could order a giant glass fish bowl full of beer.
In college towns, they’re often clubs rather than bars/pubs, so you’ll see names like “Lazy Lizard”, “Liquid Lounge”, “Shooters”, etc. The biggest and most popular one when I went to college was called “Bent Willey’s”. Sex pun aside, it was on a sharp curve near Willey St, which is probably how they got it approved.
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Bastard (reykjavik)
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Mollys (NYC)
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Tequila Mockingbird (Ocean City)
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Olive or Twist (Portland)
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Wish You Were Beer (Madison)
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Pour Boy (Toronto)
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Loose Moose (Toronto)
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Plug Uglies (NYC)
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LowBrau (sacramento)
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Pour House (everywhere)
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Beer and Loathing (Omaha)
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Deja Brew (Wendell)
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Paddy o’Beers (Raleigh)
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Crow Bar (Mount Holly)
Cool!
Tequila Mockingbird hits my sense of humour just right! I love that!
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Oddly enough in Salt Lake City, UT we have a few fun ones:
- A Bar Named Sue
- The Tavernacle (pokes fun at the mormon Tabernacle)
- Lake Effect
The Tavernacle (pokes fun at the mormon Tabernacle)
In the southern US, a lot of counties voted to prohibit the sale of alcohol. They thought prohibition was a good idea, despite the bad things that caused the nation to end prohibition at the national level. Usually this is because they are full of religious people, and these are called “dry” counties, as opposed to “wet” counties, where the sale of alcohol is legal.
A common name for a bar is “the county line” implying that it gets all the business from the neighboring “dry” county.
First stop, Last stop.
in my area of the us I find the places are trying to cash in on the dominant ethnicity of a place. So like near me they have irish names but near china town or the greek area you have chinese or greek sounding names. I mean a lot of it is not just to get the locals as the areas become and ethnic area and the people coming there are expecting an ethnic experience with bars and restaurants.
Here in Germany, traditional names for pubs are often either animals (stork, eagle, bear, lion, trout, deer, etc.) or the original owner’s name.
Not nearly as colorful as some of the other examples here but I’m not aware if there might be regional differences. My region might just be particularly boring in this regard.
“Fancy going down to ‘Erik’s Cock’ tonight?”
Der Goldene Adler.
It’s so bad that you usually have to ask which one.
I don’t go to bars anymore these days, these places are probably closed down by now since the last time I was in one of them was almost 30 years ago.
- club 21
- the oasis
- Clint’s
- Charlie’s
most the bars I went to were practically shacks in the middle of nowhere with zero name on the outside. only way you knew it was a bar was because of the beer signs outside.
Here in the NL we have names like “The Little Waterway,” “The Bridge,” “The Small Pond,” “The Barking Fish,” “The Elk,” or the original owners name or a local joke. My local place is called “Rip and Pluck”.
we have names like “The Little Waterway,” “The Bridge,” “The Small Pond,”
That’s quite charming. I’m convinced that living in the Netherlands is like living in The Shire from Lord of the Rings
In the USA Most are generic names for chains like and they are bar in grills the other are shit pubs like the Londoner that are truing to be British pubs without the culture its like a pub at Epcot. There was a place called Wickers that was great but got shutdown for kids underage drinking.
We also have a ton of local bars with wildly varying names depending on the type of theme. Auntie Mae’s, The Goose, The Goose II, Kickers (country bar), The Booby Trap, and O’Malley’s Alley are ones I recall off the top of my head plus there were tons more. A bunch more are variations on something Saloon and lots of creative puns.
There is a lot of variety in the US, mostly because it is huge and varied.
Grew up in Florida which I feel has it’s own unique style of pub names such as: The Thirsty Turtle Captain Jack’s (or any other Captain) The Brass Ring Manatee Lagoon (or other animal or place lagoon) The Square Grooper (slang for packages of cocaine found in the water or on the shore)
Canada is a lot like the UK. We have a lot of old english pub names.
