Landmark High Road Pub in Surprise Closure Announcement
The Crown shuts suddenly after failed attempt to sell venue
The Crown on Chiswick High Road this Friday
March 23, 2024
The Crown pub and restaurant on Chiswick High Road has closed this week after operating for six years.
No formal announcement has been made but customers attempting to making bookings are receiving a reply that “due to the current nature of the business the decision to close with immediate effect has been made by the owners” and the premises are currently closed up. The online booking system informs you that the next available table is on 31 December 2027.
Attempts to contact The Crown for confirmation are met with an auto-reply with the same message which adds that all staff have been made redundant and “are exempt of any responsibility in relation to the Company.”
The site, parts of which date back to the seventeenth century, used to be Chiswick’s police station before it was moved across the road to the site being converted into retirement flats. Previously it was home to Carvossos, a popular pub and restaurant, but was bought by Harcourt Inns in 2017 and then expensively refitted. The freehold pub has seating for around 39 people in the bar area with the restaurant able to accommodate 72 as well as tables on the pavement at the front of the building and a terrace at the rear. There is a private dining room in which eight people can be served and four hotel bedrooms.
It is one of three pubs own by Harcourt Inns which was founded in 2014 by James McCulloch who brought in Henry Harris, formerly of Racine in Chelsea and the Soho House Group, to oversee the group’s food offering. However, the group was badly hit by the pandemic and Mr Harris departed in 2020.
In November 2022, Harcourt Inns put all its properties on the market including The Crown which was listed as a going concern at a price of £3,750,000 but it appears there were no takers and the company was dissolved in October 2023 with James McCulloch as the sole remaining director.
Another local business owner suggested that was being run by administrators since that time and they decided to cease trading as there was no evidence that the business could be run profitably.
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