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Old Glasgow Pubs by john gorevan

 

Cloisters Bar.

Friarshall Hotel, Paisley Road West, Glasgow.

Manager John Kelly 1975

Manager John Kelly 1975.

In the NEWS 1975...

Now the Friarshall rings the bell at the Cloisters.

Fourteen years ago business man Geoff Fleming bought an old mansion house in the south end of Paisley.

He turned it into a nine-bed roomed hotel, the Friarshall, and opened its doors to the public. Nowadays the Friarshall has changed a lot. There are now 28 bedrooms, some with private bathrooms and television, an outdoor heated swimming pool and tennis courts.

And Mr Fleming's latest addition to the Friarshall is a new lounge bar, the Cloisters, which opened only last week. The new lounge bar can hold over 200 people and was the work of designer Richard Scule. The theme of actual cloisters (covered arcade) has been pretty well adhered to with the laminated arches and small olde-worlde type windows.

The seating itself has been arranged in booths which give the place a cosy atmosphere. Mr Fleming is determined that the Cloisters will not be just another lounge. "Housewives and businessmen alike can come here for morning coffee and we will have bar lunches available," he added.

When Mr Fleming talks about bar lunches he doesn't just mean the usual stuff. The day I visited the Cloisters the menu included prawn cocktail, scampi and steak and I understand smoked salmon is also available. There was also the standard sausage and mash and steak pie.

The Cloisters contains something of an innovation as that of lounge bars go... a small dance floor which Mr Fleming hopes customers will use to dance to the background music. And just to the left of the bar is a pool room with two tables.

The manager of the new bar is Mr John Kelly who, with his full and part-time staff, will be on hand to make sure your evening at the Cloisters is a pleasant one.

The large ballroom holds about 130 people and was being prepared for a wedding reception when I passed through. The swimming pool, which Mr Fleming said was "extremely popular" during the hot summer months, is in the grounds of the second house with the tennis courts behind them.

Mr Fleming hopes that the Cloisters will soon become popular not only with the Paisley "buddies" but with the folk from farther afield.

End.

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