Freemasons Tavern, Hove
| Freemasons Tavern | |
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The inn from the northwest
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| Location | 39 Western Road, Brunswick Town, Hove, Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, United Kingdom BN3 1AF |
| Coordinates | 50°49′33″N 0°09′35″W / 50.8257°N 0.1597°WCoordinates: 50°49′33″N 0°09′35″W / 50.8257°N 0.1597°W |
| Built | Early 1850s |
| Restored | 1928 (restaurant section) |
| Architect | J.L. Denman & Son (restaurant section) |
| Architectural style(s) | Classical; Art Deco |
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Listed Building – Grade II
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| Official name: The Freemasons Inn and Restaurant | |
| Designated | 2 November 1992 |
| Reference no. | 1292378 |
 Location within Brighton and Hove
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The Freemasons Tavern (also known as the Freemasons Inn and the Freemasons Inn and Restaurant) is a 19th-century pub in the Brunswick Town area of Hove, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. Built in the 1850s in a Classical style similar to the surrounding buildings in the rapidly growing Brunswick Town area, it was given a "famous" and "spectacular" renovation when a restaurant was added. Local architecture firm Denman & Son designed an ornate Art Deco interior and an elaborate, brightly coloured entrance adorned with Masonic symbols; both the exterior and the interior survive in excellent condition. The tavern is a Grade II Listed building.
The early 19th-century development of the Brunswick Town estate—a self-contained community between Hove and neighbouring Brighton, with high-class housing forming an architectural set-piece around extensive seafront lawns, and lower-class houses in surrounding streets—was prompted by the rapid growth of Brighton over the preceding half-century and the willingness of architects, builders and speculators to design impressive lodging houses to attract fashionable upper-class visitors. The estate, designed and planned mostly by Charles Busby, lay within the parish of Hove but was generally considered to be part of Brighton, which at the time was much better regarded than the "mean and insignificant assemblage of huts" (as one contemporary writer described it) which made up Hove village. Work began in 1824 and continued for many years, but a second phase involving the construction of another three grand squares was unrealised.
Brunswick Square and Brunswick Terrace (Grade I-listed since 24 March 1950) formed the residential centrepiece; commerce and other support facilities, such as a town hall, jail, market and church (which was not originally part of the estate's plan), were confined to side streets. One such was Brunswick Street West, which ran north–south from the seafront to Western Road, the main east–west route into Brighton. As well as some working-class housing, the small, narrow street supported four pubs; such high densities of pubs were common in lower-class residential areas in the Victorian era. Three survive: the Star of Brunswick, the Bow Street Runner and the prominently sited Freemasons Tavern, on the corner of Western Road and Brunswick Street West and with entrances in each.
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