Daniel Craig and Soho House owner take on The Horseshoe pub in Clerkenwell

Daniel Craig is now a co-owner of The Horseshoe, a Clerkenwell pub around 250 years old, alongside Soho House owner Nick Jones and Charlie Carroll of The Devonshire.

The fourth partner is Justin O’Shea, creative director of Bad Belze, the lager brand Craig launched. That beer is expected to be poured at the bar once the pub reopens.

When The Horseshoe in Clerkenwell reopens

The pub at 24 Clerkenwell Close, EC1R 0AG, closed in its current form on 8 October. It is due to return in late 2027, and it is not yet known whether it will keep its name.

Craig, 58, said the building will be refurbished but will not become a modern gastropub. “We’re going to keep it as a boozer,” he said. Carroll is expected to look after the food.

The Horseshoe is popular for darts at the moment, and there is no word yet on whether the board will survive the refit.

A pub with a ghost in the cellar

The Horseshoe is said to be haunted by the ghost of a hangman. Landlady Pauline Tucker has said the spirit lives in the cellar and that the buyers were not told about him at the time of the sale. “You don’t see him. You feel him,” she said.

Craig joked that the ghost did not bother him and that the owners might leave a pint downstairs for him.

The actor knows the trade from childhood. His parents and grandparents ran pubs in Cheshire, and he spent much of his youth in them, chatting with regulars about their day and sometimes their problems. “I know the good and the bad of it,” he said.