For a long time, Lily was a bit of a mystery cat. Although she can be found at the
Anglesea Arms most days, she
doesn't actually live there. But when live-in Australian deputy-manager Kathryn Wild comes down to get the pub ready for the day, somewhere around 11am, Lily will usually appear outside the window, peering in, patiently waiting for someone to open the front door for her. If Kathryn is not around, then the cleaner will usually oblige.
The elderly feline - who is predominantly white with patches of rusty-brown and black on her face, and a raccoon-like, bushy striped tail - will usually spend most of each day inside, curled up on the shelf of a mirrored, wood-panelled pillar facing the door or, in colder weather, sleeping on one of the big leather sofas
beside the fire. She is such a fixture that she has her own food bowl, which gets filled twice a day. It sits below and to the left of her portrait, painted by local artist Jenny Abbott.
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As the pub doesn't open until 5pm Monday to Thursday, she's left undisturbed all afternoon.
Later on,
she grudgingly shares her domain with the paying customers. She used to get a little gnarly with anyone who disturbed her, but she has mellowed with age, says Kathryn. Then each evening, come closing time, she departs."She might be sleeping but I just have to say, 'Lily, it's time,' and she'll get up and leave straight away," says manager Chris Welburn.
It is a very cat-friendly neighborhood. The Anglesea is within what estate agents call Brackenbury Village, a network of pretty terraced streets lined with affluent homes, boutiquey shops and not much traffic. The pub itself is a handsome place, particularly following a four-month refurb in 2014 when the place was taken over by new owners George and Richard Manners. Predating their arrival, the pub had a solid reputation as one of London's original gastropubs, and it still has an excellent kitchen
serving lunch Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and dinner seven nights a week.
The Manners brothers own six independent pubs across south-west London, each with its own character. There is one thing they all have in common: like the Anglesea, the Cumberland Arms and Dartmouth Castle, both in Hammersmith, the Swan in Chiswick, Atlas in Fulham, and Fox & Hounds on Latchmere Road in Battersea all have cats. Not all of them are as comfortable around people as Lily and some keep to the staff quarters upstairs, never venturing into the bar.
No one knows for sure how old Lily is, though Kathryn suspects she's "getting on" because she sometimes has difficulty seeing her food.
"We now have to rattle her bowl to let her know where it is," says Kathryn.
Lily still, however, maintains her peculiar habit of flipping the biscuits out of her bowl, one by one, before eating them.
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What she really loves, though, are prawns.
She has in the past leapt onto a customer's table and attempted to swipe the crustaceans.
She isn't allowed in the dining room, a rule that she respects, but people can order food to eat in the bar and regulars sometimes buy her a half-pint glass of prawns of her own.
That can get a bit messy as Lily prefers that you peel the prawns for her.
Address: Anglesea Arms, 35 Wingate Road, W6 (Ravenscourt Park tube)
Drinks: Global
wine list, decent selection of real ales
Food: High-end gastro pub selling locally sourced, seasonal produce. Menu changes daily
