Marble Arch, Manchester

73 Rochdale Road
Collyhurst
Manchester
M4 4HY
0161 832 5914

Traditional Town Pub, 3* Heritage Pub

Despite its location on Rochdale Road outside the city centre the Marble Arch has become one of Manchesters must-visit pubs. It serves beer from its own brewery, founded at the back of the pub but now in a bigger space in Salford. There are nine cask ales and eight keg beers with a mix of Marble Brewery beers and guests. The food is quite classy too with an eclectic mix of veggie-focused starters and pub classics for mains. The Marble Arch won the Pub or Beer Bar of the Year award at the Manchester Food and Drink Festival Awards in 2023.

It was built in 1888 as a prestige project for McKenna’s Brewery with prominent chimneys and an imposing entrance archway which gave the pub its name – although it’s granite, not marble (photos 3 & 4). Inside a colourful mosaic-tiled floor follows the line of the original bar counter and slopes very noticeably down to the new counter at the rear (photo 1). The walls are of glazed brick with a tiled frieze above promoting a whole range of alcoholic and soft drinks (photos 2, 5 & 6).

The ceramic walls and floor had been covered until a 1989 refurb revealed them again, and this was when the old ‘B & J McKenna’s Harpurhey Brewery’ mirror was restored to the wall above the elegant wood and marble fireplace (photo 2). At the back there is a smaller room which once housed the brewery but is now a seating area next to the kitchen. Outside is a secluded garden, extended in recent years and now with heated cabins.

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