The Founders Arms

It's the early Nineties. You're the depressed, unfulfilled landlord of an ugly, modern, frankly council boozer serving a housing estate next to a disused power station on a bleak stretch of the Thames (but with fantastic views of St Paul's). The richly teeming life of the City just across the river (but so inaccessible!), and the louring presence of the power station (so gloomy, so pointless!) seem merely to mock your every attempt at self-betterment.

Then - a life-line - a group of actors decides to replicate Shakespeare's Globe up the road, and the brewery offers a new and stylish refit. Then the Tate decides to relocate its modern collection in the power station. And then they build a bridge between you and the City, creating a new tourist route practically through the bar.

It's the London landlords' lottery of life - and you are the winner! While still no oil painting (indeed, only Guernica springs to mind), it must be said that the Founders Arms, right on the river and 100 yards from the Tate Bankside, could have been designed for the hordes of art aficionados about to descend on the area: eminently accessible; big (covers for 100); with a pleasantly contemporary wood-and-glass interior (stamped with trendy, martini-glass-shaped Ys for Young's; and no pictures of the dear old Queen Mum); a spacious and sun-bathed terrace for summer; truly panoramic views over the City; food that is surprisingly well conceived, fresh and well prepared; and, above all, modern. It's the new Morpeth Arms - the old Tate's Young's pub - for the Noughties.

Founders Arms
52 Hopton Street, SE1 9JH