What’s Behind The Door?

National World - LocalTV

We take a peek behind the door of some hidden gems around the country.

Transcript

00:00Whether it's a hidden room behind a wall, easter eggs in your favourite computer game,

00:14or just discovering a hidden gem of a place in a city you thought you knew like the back

00:18of your hand, we all love finding a nice surprise behind a door we never thought to open.

00:23We've been looking behind those doors up and down the country for you, starting with

00:26Emma pulling that special book on that special bookshelf in Bristol.

00:30So I am here in what appears like a Bristol library, but I've got a sneaky suspicion

00:35it's a little bit more than that.

00:37Ooh, something's definitely happening.

00:48So the library was created for our customers to be able to have pre and post drinks originally,

00:54but thankfully the library's now turned into a staple part of Bristol hospitality, mainly

01:00due probably to the entrance and the quality of drinks we serve here, and the style of

01:06the venue which is in keeping with most of our venues that we build.

01:10Definitely focused on experience here, and it's all about the human interaction and being

01:16able to go out and try new exciting things, and a lot of what we do here is try and bring

01:21weird flavour combinations together that people wouldn't necessarily have thought to

01:24do themselves, and I think that kind of creative tasting is what brings people back out to

01:31bars and that kind of thing.

01:33So this part of Bristol is the oldest part of the Bristol, right by Castle Park, which

01:36used to be the main centre of Bristol before the Blitz.

01:40The mug shop building we have down the road is like 198 years old, so we kind of fell

01:44in love with this part of Bristol, just purely because of the age, it's stunning, and then

01:49luckily enough we were able to get hold of this venue here, the library, so all our businesses

01:54are kind of stretched on this street.

01:56I'd say we're quite unique, so the library itself is a multi-use venue, so in the day

02:04times on the later part of the week and the weekend we open up as an afternoon tea parlour.

02:09To be honest, I think it would be the same for most chefs, it's a bit of a noisy world

02:15out there, and there are very few moments where you're just fully doing what you're

02:19doing, as opposed to, you know, focused on X, Y, or Z.

02:22So this is a macaron, or macaroon, which is it?

02:27A macaron is like this, and a macaroon with an S is actually the little ones with coconut.

02:37Coconut, yeah, so it's not the same.

02:40So let's try a macaron.

02:41A macaron.

02:42A macaron.

02:43Cheers.

02:44Cheers.

02:45Hoppa.

02:49So is a margarita a popular cocktail here?

02:56Definitely, we have a lot of people that come here specifically for margaritas, which, yeah,

03:02of course, more than welcome, and then you have to have a sip to make sure that it tastes

03:06well.

03:07So you've done half a rim?

03:08Half a rim, just, yeah, to make sure that if someone doesn't want a full salt rim, they

03:13can choose to not.

03:15They are very, very nice.

03:17Happy?

03:18That is delicious.

03:20Lovely, well done, of course.

03:23Well, now I feel like I've got a cocktail qualification.

03:26Yeah, absolutely, you definitely do.

03:29Well, never mind the artisan drinks being served at the bar, the idea of a secret room

03:33behind a bookshelf might be literally one of the coolest things you'll ever see.

03:38What could outdo that?

03:39Well, I'm not sure, but we could try a secret tunnel in the middle of busy London Street.

03:44Here's Jack to tell us more.

03:46There are plenty of hidden gems in London, but on Leinster Garden, there is a secret

03:53tunnel hidden underneath these buildings.

03:56Along this beautiful street lies a little-known mystery created in the 1800s.

04:02Tucked away in Paddington in between the station and the world-famous Hyde Park is Leinster

04:07Gardens, a street that might appear normal to the average person, but those with an eagle

04:14eye will spot that two large buildings between two fancy hotels have been boarded up.

04:20And that's because they are props.

04:22Yep, that's right.

04:24Like a film set, these buildings are designed to create an illusion of a perfect street.

04:29But from the road behind, a secret is in fact revealed.

04:34No one lives inside.

04:36It's not real.

04:37And if you're taking a gander around the block through the quaint side streets and onto the

04:42road behind called Porches to Terrace, behind a big wall, everything is cleared up.

04:48Now if you're tall enough to see over the wall, which I'm not, but luckily I have a

04:52tripod, you'll find that the houses are actually an exterior to tunnels and that the London

04:58underground passes underneath where the houses should be.

05:03Although it looks like some sort of Harry Potter magic trick, this is one of London's

05:07hidden gems and makes 23 to 24 lines to gardens one of the quirkiest houses in the whole of

05:14the UK, but especially in London.

05:18I would have walked past those houses and never had a clue that she was just running

05:21through behind those facades.

05:22Amazing.

05:24Maybe not quite so hidden, but behind some impressive graffiti, Emily has found a really

05:28quirky bar with an interest in history on an unassuming Liverpool street.

05:32Hobo kiosk is quite possibly the friendliest and strangest little pub in the Baltic Triangle,

05:37with a unique design, a cosy atmosphere and a warm approach to hospitality, which Liverpool

05:43is famed for.

05:44This was an empty shell when we first started.

05:48We turned it into a shop and then we took it back to an empty shell again and we built

05:52various bits and pieces.

05:53I found the counter out on the streets.

05:57It was an old wardrobe.

05:59Three days after Tristan moved to the city, he met Delia and they've been together ever

06:03since.

06:04We were going to take it as an art shop for two years.

06:08We were going to walk away and it was the boys from Golf Fang who both individually

06:15said this would make a great micro pub.

06:19It's all about micro pubs.

06:20We were like, well, come again?

06:22We have no idea what they were.

06:24The couple both worked in community art for 40 years before opening the space.

06:28Delia and I, Mrs Hobo, we were both community artists working in a variety of situations

06:37on the streets, in prisons, hospitals, with kids with locked in autism, every possible

06:43marginalised community.

06:45And come the credit crunch back in 2010, unfortunately, first out the door were us artists.

06:53As well as serving up a curated selection of drinks from the likes of local breweries,

06:57the place is also a feast for the eyes with its distinctive design.

07:01We have a house that's very like this, in fact more so.

07:04We often say this pub is like a minimalist Japanese stripped vac version of our house.

07:12Its walls are adorned with vintage prints, signs, paintings and it seems every spare

07:17space is taken up by unusual objects, from mannequins to a mariachi hat.

07:22We populated this space with our art and attracted other people that have been giving

07:29us some really interesting things.

07:32And it's then that we began to notice that people responded to the space.

07:38The European Bar Guide, which visits and profiles pubs and bars around the continent, recently

07:43named the establishment Joint Toff in the City alongside Peter Cavanagh's.

07:48The guide described it as unique with a distinctive identity and character, a basement bar with

07:53local beers and fabulous hospitality.

07:56We realised as we went along was that far from this being frankly our pension, something

08:01we could do and then get the heck out of Dodge.

08:05We enjoyed it, it gave us something exciting and something of value ourselves.

08:12But also, we saw what people were getting from the kiosk, the Hobo kiosk itself.

08:19It can be tricky to find and you have to get your timings right to get in the door.

08:24When you come in here, if you're being a little rowdy, Mrs Hobo will show you the rules.

08:32That's the sort of venue you could spend hours looking around.

08:36From one bar in Liverpool to Urban Regeneration and a little known tunnel that stretches for

08:41miles under Newcastle.

08:42So we're currently in the Ouseburn Trust office.

08:46We are a regeneration charity, a development trust, and we were set up in the 90s to spearhead

08:53the regeneration of Ouseburn, so it was quite a derelict, run-down, old industrial area.

08:59And if you've been down here, you will have seen it's changed hugely even over the last

09:03five years.

09:04And we did a lot of work towards that and were heavily involved in that side of things.

09:09Nowadays we look after the Victoria Tunnel, which is a heritage spot, and we also look

09:16after all of the green spaces in the Ouseburn.

09:19So the Victoria Tunnel, it was built in 1842 as a way to transport the coal from, there's

09:25a mine over at Spittletongues and they needed to transport it down to the river, and instead

09:29of taking it through the town and spreading all of the coal dust, they built this tunnel

09:34underground to transport it.

09:36So it was down there, it wasn't actually open that long, I won't give too much away because

09:42you find out on the tour, but it wasn't open that long, and then it got a new lease of

09:46life in the Second World War, so it was used as an air raid shelter.

09:49So we run 15 public tours a week, so it's every day apart from Tuesday, we're running

09:54tours, which gives you a history and an overview of what the tunnel was used for.

10:01We also have a lot of school groups come and visit, so twice a week we have schools in

10:06and they get a shorter version of the history and they get a classroom session on what it

10:13was like to live either in Victorian times or during World War II, and then they get

10:16taken into the tunnel and they get to learn about that.

10:21We also do special events, so we do a wine tasting in the tunnel, which is really cool,

10:25very atmospheric, and that's a collaboration with Hotel Duvin, and we also do gigs in the

10:31tunnel, which is, we call it Sounds of the Underground, which I like as a Girls Aloud fan.

10:37Yeah, it's a really interesting space to see gigs.

10:41But the primary thing is the public tours, which is a historical insight into what it

10:47was used for and its story.

10:53Ouseburn especially was such an industrial area, it was mainly factories, and I think

10:59a lot of the stories of people who worked in those situations are lost over time, because

11:03it was more working class.

11:06So I think a huge goal of ours is to keep that heritage alive and keep those stories

11:11going, and also in the way that Ouseburn looks, it's really important to us to keep those

11:17historical buildings going, so you'll see kind of like, I don't know, things that remind

11:22you that it was once a mill or it was once a factory, those elements are still kept in

11:26the buildings.

11:29And we also work quite a lot with developers to try and make sure they hang on to that

11:35heritage.

11:36Yeah, I think Ouseburn has a real charm, and that's because of the heritage being kept

11:41alive here.

11:42It's nice to see that even after regeneration, the history of the Ouseburn area of Newcastle

11:47has still been kept intact, and I do like the idea of an Underground gig.

11:51Well, that's all we've got behind our doors for now, but hopefully it's given you a thirst

11:55to try and peek behind the doors of some hidden gems in your town.

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