The Monarch

Recommended by a friend, we are from the USA and don’t have places like this around us. What a great bar, atmosphere, food and drinks. My god, it’s Wednesday night and there’s great live music !!! I love this place.!! Wish I lived closer, I’d be here almost every night !

If you’re an American or a woman, don’t go here. The bouncers are condescending and treat you like you have no brain. Also, don’t bother talking to the manager because he won’t help you either. He just goes with whatever the bouncer says.

Good music and fun atmosphere

Not a bad pub, with nice seating and patio. I had the steak sandwich, which I didn’t expect to come with cheese and it seemed an odd combination but it worked. The meat was good, and the flavour was nice. I would go again.

Popped by with my girlfriends for a late lunch and I think the highlight was the food. The Monarch is a pub, and as we all know pub food can be either awful or quite ok. The food we had was very nice, a bit pricey for what we got but still good.
The interior is like a standard pub nothing more nothing less. Good service, clean (ish) loos.
Overall nothing to complain about but I wasn’t amazed. But definitely happy about our lunch.

Great ribs and they have some great geeky quizzes every month or so which are really good fun but you need to book in advance so make sure you’ve checked the upcoming events.

I had a great night out here at The Monarch! I went on a Friday night and it had a great vibe and a great atmosphere. I paid £2 entry fee– which I think is very reasonable because although a lot of the pubs in Camden don’t charge, £2 really isn’t very much and it is definitely one of the better pubs to go to.
Drinks were very reasonably priced too and every time I went to the bar I got served straight away. No waiting around for ages for someone to take my drinks order which was really good seeing as it was so busy,
The music was great! Really varied music styles being played throughout the night. I went with a large group of people all with different music tastes and everyone was happy and having a great time!
I’ll definitely come here more often.

The pub has really disappointed on my last visit. The décor and charm are still there, the toilets were actually cleaner than last time, but the food! It seemed like the average pub fair it should be, but my fish tasted very chemical, I’m not quite sure how to describe the taste, kind of as if it had been soaked in a cleaner chemical. I took two bites and left the rest on my plate.
The peas and chips seemed fine but I had a very upset stomach the next morning, so something just wasn’t quite right.
I’ll probably come back for the quizzes but I’ll steer clear of the food in the future.

The Monarch is hands down, one of my favourite venues in London. Whether it be for a pint, a gig or a hell of a dance with some brilliant DJs, this venue has never failed to instate a great time!
To expand, there is always something going on — and the events are so beautifully varied (you can check their website in advance for all listings)
The internal décor engages in a comforting hybrid between a leathery camden pub that meanders down to some more lovely seating, a pool table, a shot/​bottle bar, and then up again to the dance floor/​stage, and then up again to more lovely areas to chill out in.
The Monarch itself is also given a quirky and amusing personality.
EG: Free entry on Fridays if you bring a Pineapple!
And even then, entry is only £2!
Recently, I booked a booth for my birthday (for FREE) thanks to the snappy and responsive email manner of the manager, Mark. He quickly and kindly organised my guest-​list and even arranged a free bottle of Prosecco.
The drinks are pretty decently priced for Camden Town too!
Can’t ask for fairer than that!

I went here for a weekday lunch. I figured it must be fun in the evenings. But I’ll keep my review to the lunchtime offerings. I like the old wood, wide round booths, and spaciousness. I bet it’s heaving on a Saturday night, but on Tuesday afternoon it was easy to get a table for 7 of us.
I got the fish and chips, which was quite acceptable. In fact, I liked the peas better than most I get. Others in my group got the curry beef pie, ham and eggs, and a sandwich. Nobody was raving wildly, but nobody was disappointed either.
It was school holidays the day I went in and I saw quite a few families with toddlers and small children.
It has a small (7 foot?) pool table that was in tolerable condition. All in all I was glad I went and will probably go again.

I think the true character of a place reveals itself when something goes wrong. Which is what happened on a Saturday night out with friends at The Monarch. It was nothing serious, but basically I was at the bar, waited, waited some more, watched the barmaid serve someone who had just come to the bar, got tired of waiting, so waved at the barmaid and she finally acknowledged I was there, but she then inexplicably proceeded to serve the person next to me who also was after me in the «queue». And I know there is no real queue at the bar, but it’s part of the bartender’s job to try and serve people in the order that they arrive at the bar and this barmaid was failing miserably. I then tried to talk to her over the loud music and got told off for yelling at the barmaid!
To top things off, I then asked another member of staff to get me the manager and guess what, he/​she was «too busy».
I’m sure it’s fine most of the time and I actually liked the space itself, but I think Unilocalers should avoid places like this out of principle as they are too busy for their own good.

Si vous êtes à la recherché d’un pub sans touristes ou presque en plein Camden, un lieu un peu typique autant pour le cadre que pour l’ambiance, vous l’avez trouvé !
Un super service, un décor vraiment chouette, de la bonne bière, du bon son, une bonne ambiance…
A noter qu’il font régulièrement des petits concerts à l’intérieur, et que ça vaut toujours le déplacement !

One of my favorite areas in London is called Camden. One bar we visited is The Monarch. The décor features monarchs, not surprisingly.
Although, we didn’t eat any food here, we did notice that they have typical bar food. We just enjoyed beer on tap.
They have a bar, as well as tables, and even a couch. We sat at the couch, where some girls joined us. They were locals, who wanted to chat with the tourists. The people were friendly, and the beer was good.

The Monarch is a pub in chalk farm really cool… there is live music every day and usually it’s free and the food that they served is awesome… I love the places where you can listen new bands and come inside the london underground scene! Thanks Monarch!

Quite divey but they had a decent spirits selection and the staff was nice. Kind of a laid back casual environment that seems plausible for large groups or one on one drinks with someone special. The upstairs adds to the versatility of the atmosphere you’d like.
There are pool tables as well!
This is a solid place to see a show as well. Lots of seating and space.

I’ve always heard good things about The Monarch so when we were in Camden last Saturday and disappointed that Camden Beach at The Roundhouse was randomly closed and that we had to find elsewhere, we went in and expected a hell of a lot more and better than we received. Actually I’m not even sure why we stayed.
I popped to the loo on arrival whilst my friend ordered us a jug of Pimms, which when I returned had been given to us and without fruit (as they’d run out — how hard is it to buy fruit from the market — which is opposite! — or anywhere in Camden?! You can’t have Pimms without fruit!) and also without glasses which it took the barmaid ages to give us when she finally tore herself away from chatting to her workmate! These were finally given to us and about half an hour later when we were well into our drinks and chatting away, my friend said «I didn’t realise you were wearing lipstick», I said «Errr random, but I’m not. Why?» To which she pointed at my glass which had a bright pink lipstain on. Grim. I felt physically sick.
On this note, it’s appropriate to mention the toilets which were disgusting, they were dingy, grotty and you felt like you’d contract something just on entry. :-s
I was really disappointed and wish we’d not stayed but after hearing so many good things from here, friends and hearsay I expected a whole lot more.

Spacious venue. Came here early on a saturday night, very quiet, not a lot of people in yet. It was just a DJ on the stage that night too.
Easily found a couched area upstairs near the toilets for our group of 8.
Nice. I’ll be back.

Quite an odd venue but really nice, a decent sized stage and seating/​dancefloor area out the front with seating arranged in booths and sofas down the back and upstairs means this pub has a lot of space. Bar service is good and on busy nights the staff are very quick (and there are loads of them).
Bouncers are also very reasonable in my experience and deal with troublemakers quickly.
Saturday nights are Soundtracks and they are ace, the premise being they can play anything from a movie soundtrack (which means pretty much anything they like tbh). This involves the usual cheesy singalongs (Don’t Stop believin’, Ghostbusters, Back to the Future, etc.) but the sets tend to be really varied, from classic rock through jungle, Classic 90s RnB, Motown, Soul, Pop and more besides. For a fun drunken night out with mates you can’t go far wrong with Soundtracks, a cut-​above many nights in Camden. Go along for halloween or NYE for something a bit special.
Also, if you’re planning a birthday or something the venue will let you book a booth/​seating section if you get in early enough.

This place is so odd that I can’t help but give it a good review. Wandered down here with colleagues for Friday drinks once and have gone back multiple times since. The beer is cheap. So are the shots. And the mixed drinks. I believe I was paying £2 for a vodka + soda water… and it was a healthy sized drink.
The décor is shabby-​shabby that was maybe once shabby-​chic? The back patio is nice if your party is smaller. There’s tons of space all over the bar. It feels like walking into a movie set that people forgot about 30 years ago or something.
The staff seems like they don’t care about serving you, but they’re always quick and efficient in getting drinks, so who cares?
Also, the music! It’s always somewhat fascinating. In a generally good way.
Definitely not a nice place to take a date, but a great locale for drinks with friends!
Oh, and if you book a table on Fridays, you get free nachos. They’re basically just doritos with melted cheese, but they’re FREE. So there’s that.

Maybe I was there on an off night, but I was incredibly disappointed by the Monarch, especially after all the rave reviews I’d read here on Unilocal.
I went on a Saturday night (maybe that was the problem?) and the place was packed with the sketchiest people I’ve ever seen assembled in one place. Trying to dance was more like trying to walk through a mine field, avoiding all the weirdos who kept ruining a night out with the girls. The music was so-​so — it was Soundtracks night where they play music from movies. I might have enjoyed it had I been either really drunk or in a singalong mood… but I wasn’t. Plus, glass ALL over the floor. I walked out and could still feel the crunch under my feet.
So, I’m sorry, but chances are slim that I’ll be returning to this place in the near future. At least not for a cover on a Saturday night.

The washrooms at The Monarch were among the most terrifying I’ve ever visited in my life. There was no toilet paper to speak of, not even a square inch of paper towel, the doors didn’t close properly AND it was dark. When I returned to the bar to ask for toilet paper I was handed a giant roll of industrial strength j-​cloths (ie for washing dishes).
I was told to check out The Monarch «because that’s where Amy Winehouse and Pete Doherty go», and lo and behold, Pete Doherty had a show scheduled there the very night I went.
The bartender was friendly but confessed that he despised the (awesome) music that the bar was playing and preferred to listen to Rancid and Slipknot on his iPod while working the bar.
We met so many shady characters while lounging on the couches in the back. Promoters, sports fans, toothless joes and ridiculous hipsters wearing jeans that were 50 sizes too small. Good prices and decent selection.