Discover the Story of Desi Pubs
Landmark Project | 2016 onwards
Desi pubs are a unique part of the Black Country’s cultural identity, where traditional British pubs blend with South Asian flavours, music, and community spirit. Creative Black Country has been celebrating these vibrant spaces for years, showcasing how they bring people together through food, friendship, and culture.
Celebrating Our local Desi Pubs
Creative Black Country has been working with pub landlords, artists, and communities to celebrate and document desi pubs through a variety of projects. From live performances and cultural celebrations to storytelling and film that capture the history and voices of these spaces, we’ve highlighted the richness and diversity of desi pub culture. Alongside this, we’ve collaborated with artists, writers, and local people to create new work that shares these stories with wider audiences.
An Extraordinary Story
Desi Pubs is an extraordinary story about migration, survival, love and food. For over 40 years, the Black Country has been quietly incubating a gastro revolution, the ‘Desi pub’.
It’s an East-meets-West tale, where the classic English pub, with its ales, darts and dominos, meets Punjabi food and Bhangra.
Landlords and Artists
Landlords Beera, Jinder, Jeet, Dal, Slack and Amrik opened their pub doors to six artists, sharing personal life stories and experiences over a pint. Together with pub staff and communities, they helped shape bespoke creations that captured the heart and soul of each venue and its punters.
The artworks included portraits, stained glass windows, photography, mosaics, and handcrafted pub signs, each produced for permanent display in the pubs. This growing collection is part of a wider body of work by Creative Black Country, which also includes an archive, broadcasts and a publication.
At the Heart of the Story
“The project is about telling this extraordinary story in the sincerest way and paying homage to the people at the heart of it. The story has many layers and includes tales of migration, survival, love, and the remarkable meeting point of the English Pub and once Indian migrant.”
— Parminder Dosanjh, Creative Director at Creative Black Country
Read more about our Desi Pubs Project…
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DESI PUBS press coverage
Arts Council England
Long Live the Arty Party PubBBC Get Creative – Time please! Join a Desi pub crawl
East meets West in Desi pubs, where the classic English pub with its ales, darts and dominos meets Punjabi food and Bhangra music. Join Get Creative champions Creative Black Country on a unique Desi Pub crawl.Central News
Central News did a broadcast to cover the launch of the newly installed pub signs in October which included interviews with the Desi Pub landlords, regulars and artists.Inapub Trade Jounal
Front Cover and double page spreadBirmingham Mail – Punjabi pub signs to be put up at Desi pubs in Black Country
Birmingham and the Black Country have been blessed by an explosion of Desi pubs – offering authentically Punjabi food in a Great British boozer. Now seven of the Desi pubs in the region are getting their own distinct sign – in Punjabi.Great Barr Observer – Unique Indian-inspired signs to be unveiled to celebrate booming Punjabi Pub Trade in West Brom
A PROJECT celebrating the rise of the Punjabi pub trade in the Birmingham and the Black Country is set to go live later this month – when specially-made signs are to be hung outside.The Economist – Pakoras and pints: Raising a glass to Britain’s Indian pubs
N THE 1960s, the Ivy Bush public house in Smethwick, West Midlands enforced a colour bar. An ad hoc system, it barred Asian and Caribbean men—most of whom had migrated to the town to work in its flourishing foundries—from the premises. Today, the Ivy Bush is owned and run by Lakhbir Singh Gill, who took over the pub 23 years ago, and it is one of many “desi” pubs in the region (“desi” is a vernacular term meaning “of South Asia”).Desi Blitz – Cyrus Todiwala talks Desi Pubs in the Black Country
Paying homage to the rich Asian heritage of the Midlands, Cyrus Todiwala reflects on the significance of Desi Pubs with Creative Black Country.Arts Council England – A story of East meets West Midlands
The world’s first Punjabi pub signs designed by artist Hardeep Pandhal have been unveiled at Desi Pubs in the Black Country. The signs can be seen along with a new series of artworks telling stories about migration, survival, love and food.Black Country Pub – Desi pubs: ower precious Punjabi jewels
Yow dow av to go deep, or far, for Desi in the Black Country. No, not at all. Yow only av to scratch the surface to find one of the many delightful Desi pubs that are scattered, like precious Punjabi jewels, across ower industrial heartland.Paul Fulford Blog – You’ve never seen pub signs like this before
The world’s first Punjabi pub signs will be hung at seven Desi pubs across the Black Country this month.
The signs are part of a project to commemorate the visit to Smethwick 50 years ago by American civil rights campaigner Malcolm X.Red Bull Amaphiko – The phenomenon of Britain’s Desi Pubs
Last week an art project celebrating British-Indian pubs in the West Midlands unveiled pub-based artworks including old-fashioned swinging signage and stained glass windows.Burnt Roti – Desi Pubs at Alchemy 2016
The Desi Pubs installation at Alchemy 2016 (Southbank Centre) is an outcome of a project started in 2015 by Creative Black Country in collaboration with the owners, landlords and punters of The Red Lion, The Fourways, The Prince of Wales, Island Inn, the Sportsman, the Red Cow, and the Ivy Bush pubs located across the erstwhile industrial heartland known as the Black Country of the UK’s West Midlands.Express Foodie – The Desi Pubs of Great Britain
In the 1950s, after the Second World War, Britain decided to open its borders to immigrants, mostly from its former colonies. The Royal Commission on Population had decided that immigrants of “good stock” would be welcomed “without reserve”. And so a large number of people from the Caribbean, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh (then East Pakistan) sailed to Britain in search of a new life in the West. Britain needed cheap labour to rebuild its economy, which, after the Second World War, lay in tatters.Yahoo News: Desi Pubs are a Thing in the UK
India 101: Desi Pubs are a Thing in the UK
Behind the bar, you’ll find Bhangra, Punjabi food, and Mr. Singh. The pub: an institution that’s as British as the Queen and as ubiquitous as bad weather. In the UK, the pub is the cornerstone of a community, a place where everyone knows the landlord’s name and becomes intimate with each other’s personal business.Caught By the River Blog – Shadows & Reflections
My best day out this year involved a trip to Smethwick in the West Midlands. I went on a Desi pub crawl organised by Creative Black Country – ‘Desi’ referring to the Indian diaspora – with writer friend Rahul Verma.
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