Look for the refaced frontage, the slightly overhanging first floor, and the White Lion sign that marks this old pub on Sopwell Lane.
The White Lion carries itself rather modestly, but its bones reach back to the late sixteenth century. Behind that smoother street face sits a timber-framed building, and that little overhang above you is the clue: the upper floor projects slightly over the one below, a very old-fashioned gesture. Historic England protects it as a Grade Two listed building, which simply means it has special historic interest and cannot be altered casually.
By seventeen thirty-five, people already called this place the White Lion, though the paperwork lets slip an earlier name: the Three Cupps. That same deed reveals something even more intriguing. Part of the premises had served as a meeting house, then a brewhouse, so this address lived more than one life before settling fully into being a pub. In the seventeen forties, Samuel Long, William Wiltshire, Henry Potter and Moses Machorro all appear in the deeds, buying, mortgaging and rearranging it as valuable Sopwell Lane property. If you glance at the image in the app, you can see the street that kept this house commercially tempting for centuries.
It was not always entirely respectable, either. Local police once disliked the White Lion because its three exits made it wonderfully easy for troublemakers to vanish. Later, landlord David Worcester earned praise from C-A-M-R-A, the Campaign for Real Ale, for the quality of the beer, though in two thousand and fifteen a former landlord still landed in court over a live-music licence breach. These days it remains a moderately priced pub with daily opening from noon until eleven.
The White Lion proves that a quiet frontage can conceal a remarkably restless past. When you are ready, continue on to the Hare and Hounds.
