First look at the Royal Oak pub in the Shambles in Chesterfield
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00:00with Megan Patrick at Royal Oak which is opening on Good Friday after four years closure how are
00:07you guys feeling? Excited yeah no we're looking forward to it it's been a lot of hard work
00:13we've been a couple of weeks now since we've just been focusing on this and not been teaching as
00:18well so that's been a bit easier but it's been a lot of hard work and we're delighted to the
00:24point where we've got it got it to still a few bits to go before we open but we're just excited
00:28to get people in it yeah definitely what have you had to do to make Chesterfield's oldest pub
00:34fit for reopening? A lot of scraping a lot of painting a very very large deep clean
00:45and then just sort of bringing in elements that make what's already here sort of shine basically
00:55the bar's probably the best example of that yeah um yeah it's been a lot of work but you know it
01:00looks it looks well we think it looks great um yeah what have you had to do to the bar then?
01:06um oh delivery um so we've had to uh scrape off about 17 layers of paint and um
01:18vinyl stickers and just some really bad interior design decisions um well I think yeah choices of
01:30the times choices of the time yeah we've had a lot of different layers of various different things
01:35but we've just tried to basically strip everything back we want it to look as well um original as
01:42possible to itself um by sort of removing various bits but we don't want to we don't really want to
01:46change and the building itself is speaks for itself it's a wonderful building we just wanted to sort
01:50of yeah let that let that shine through. How have you put your mark on the um
01:55I think the yellow walls is probably quite a good place to start. I believe it did have once have
02:02similar similarish color walls but I'm not 100% sure. Um a good dart setup. Oh yeah we've uh yeah
02:09we're big on big on darts at the Royal Oak I think that's probably the most personal to me. Yeah um our
02:14collection of beer artifacts and a suit of armor. Yeah Gerald. Tell us about Gerald then.
02:23Gerald is uh Gerald's just a suit of armor that uh exists next door um as you'll hopefully all come
02:29and see and uh yeah he uh he will be dressed according to the season he just fits in with the
02:35theme of the Knights Templar which obviously runs through this pub um and a bit of historical
02:40historical twist in yeah in a very historic room. What are you offering customers in terms of liquid
02:49refreshments? Um so we've got eight cask, eight keg and box cider all from sort of independent sources
02:58around the UK um we've got a good selection of spirits and whiskey and lots of nice organic wine.
03:05And to satisfy appetites for tea water. Ah well uh we've gone we've gone for pies so we want to keep
03:17it as traditional as possible. We were umming and ahhing about whether we were going to do food
03:21at all but we thought that it would be as welcoming as possible to be giving a food offering and we've
03:27certainly gone for something that we think befitting a pub such as this which is just a selection of fine
03:31pies from pie minister who Meg used to work for. Yeah back when I was a student. Yeah we've sampled them
03:37they are fantastic there's uh something in there for everyone we've got um a few meat options vegetarian
03:44gluten-free vegan all sorts um yeah in our seven pie choice but yeah. What activities will you have to
03:52attract people? Well first and foremost we do have darts set up um which although it's it's difficult because
04:00it's quite a cozy pub and you'll have to move tables around but we will certainly be playing here
04:06downstairs on our Wednesday leave nights and we've also got a very good selection of board games which
04:13i have curated over many years um which clearly i had a purpose for that i didn't know about um we'll
04:21also be having regular quiz nights and regular folk sessions also. Yeah we're a big fan of quizzes so a lot
04:28of the board games are just quizzes uh but you know it's nice to go into a pub and pick up a quiz and
04:32yeah give it a go over a pint and a packet of crisps or whatever. What plans do you have for the future?
04:39Ah well we um hopefully going to have an outside area that's sort of the big plan on the horizon
04:46um we're sort of working towards that over the next probably next few months hopefully by the summer
04:50because again we just want it to be somewhere that people are able to come as well on a sunny day
04:53it's going to be a great winter pub um i think it already is but we also want to attract um yeah
04:59sort of people want to sit in the sun as we would um and it's gonna hopefully yeah just bring something
05:05new fresh to the shambles having an outside um outside beer area so that's that's a big plan for
05:10the future um but we're hoping really to just be you know um having sort of changing beers having as many
05:18different things on as possible for people to try and be interested in coming down to taste i'm
05:21interested in yeah and you're open six days a week yeah uh closed on mondays yeah everyone needs a day
05:30off everyone including us yeah so we're going to be closed on mondays and then we're going to be open
05:35from 10 a.m um every other week past sunday when we're open a little bit later but we do want it to
05:40be somewhere um where people come for coffee as well so that's why we're open from 10. what time are we
05:46open on sunday then 12 12 12 yeah