Flask Walk

Flask Walk is a historic cobbled lane in Hampstead, London, famous for its 1874 Victorian pub, The Flask, which originated from a 1700s mineral water business. The discovery of iron-rich chalybeate wells in 1698 turned Hampstead into a spa town, selling bottled water for three pence a flask. Rebuilt in 1874, The Flask pub retains original mahogany partitions. In 1937, artist Charles Ginner depicted the lane in a painting now at the Tate Gallery.

London Β· from the walk β€œHampstead Uncovered: Village Secrets & Heath Legends” Β· Generated

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Flask Walk, Hampstead, London NW3 1HE

How did Flask Walk in Hampstead get its name?

Take a breath. Look at the cobblestones beneath your feet. This narrow lane called Flask Walk is one of Hampstead's best-kept secrets... and its story begins with water.

Back in sixteen ninety-eight, mineral wells were discovered here, and Hampstead transformed from a sleepy hilltop village into a fashionable spa town. The water was chalybeate... meaning it was rich in iron salts bubbling up from deep underground. It tasted absolutely Awful β€” like drinking rusty nails β€” but the worse it tasted, the more people believed it was doing them good!

Now here's where this little lane gets its name. On this very site stood the original Flask Tavern, where the mineral water business was run from at least seventeen hundred. The water was bottled and sold at three pence a flask, distributed by a London apothecary called Mr. Philips, who operated from the Eagle and Child pub on Fleet Street. The advertising boldly claimed that "eminent physicians" who had previously drunk the Tunbridge waters now Preferred the Hampstead water. Imagine... London's first bottled water craze, born right here on these cobblestones.

But there were actually Two Flask taverns in Hampstead. This one was known as the Lower Flask, to distinguish it from the Upper Flask β€” a grander tavern near the top of Hampstead hill, patronized by Whig grandees and writers. That Upper Flask was the summer meeting place of the famous Kit-Cat Club β€” powerful literary and political figures like Walpole, who some historians believe helped engineer the Glorious Revolution. Meanwhile, the Lower Flask β€” Our Flask β€” had a rather rougher reputation. In Samuel Richardson's novel Clarissa, it's described as a place where second-rate persons are found... in a swinish condition.

But the humble Lower Flask had the last laugh. The Upper Flask closed in the seventeen fifties and was eventually demolished. This one was rebuilt in eighteen seventy-four, replacing a thatched-roof pub called the Thatched House, and survives as The Flask pub to this day. Step inside and you'll find remarkably intact Victorian interiors β€” glass and mahogany partitions, original cast-iron fireplaces, and beautiful tiled surrounds.

And one more gem. In nineteen thirty-seven, the artist Charles Ginner painted this exact view β€” Flask Walk decorated with flags and bunting for the coronation of King George the Sixth β€” from his window just across the high street. That painting now hangs in the Tate Gallery.

Look around you... While Hampstead High Street has been taken over by chains, Flask Walk keeps a quirkier, more independent identity. These wooden shopfronts, these flower boxes, this quiet hum of village life... three hundred years of history in a single cobblestoned lane.

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