logo
West End bar wins Glasgow pub of the year at national awards

West End bar wins Glasgow pub of the year at national awards

Glasgow Times01-07-2025
The cosy pub, kitchen and terrace opened in August last year and offers delicious brunch, lunch and dinner menus featuring fresh seafood and meat from the islands.
They also showcase live music every weekend and host a pub quiz every Wednesday.
Judges chose the bar as the winner for Glasgow City, which recognises pub businesses in regions across the UK.
West End bar wins Glasgow pub of the year at national awards (Image: Supplied)
READ MORE: 'Looks amazing': New Rangers bar honouring club icon reveals 'legends' menu
Two of The Horn's sister outlets also took the top awards in their areas at this year's National Pub & Bar Awards, which recognise 'excellence across a number of elements that affect the customer journey, including design, service, style of offer, marketing and investment'.
The Ben Nevis Bar in Fort William was named Highland Pub of the Year for the third year running, and Macgochans in Tobermory on the Isle of Mull was named Argyll & Bute Pub of the Year for the second year in a row.
Kelly Kyle, manager of The Horn, said the award is a huge achievement for the whole team.
The bar offers a cosy interior (Image: Supplied)
READ MORE: Much-loved restaurant with 'rooftop seating sun trap' reopens under new name
She said: 'It's amazing and means so much to us all.
'The Horn is a great pub with a great atmosphere, and we've got loads of lovely customers –students, locals and those from further afield – who have made The Horn their local, so huge thanks to them for all their support.
'We've also got a brilliant team, and this award recognises each of them and their hard work. We're all just chuffed to bits!'
Neil Morrison, MD of The Rocks Leisure Group, which includes The Horn, Ben Nevis Bar and Macgochans, said: 'This is a brilliant achievement by the whole team at The Horn!
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

John Standing: ‘I danced with Brigitte Bardot in St Tropez'
John Standing: ‘I danced with Brigitte Bardot in St Tropez'

Times

time24-07-2025

  • Times

John Standing: ‘I danced with Brigitte Bardot in St Tropez'

The actor John Standing, 90, has been in the business for 70 years — he was nominated for an Olivier award in 1979 for Close of Play at the National Theatre and appeared with Michael Caine in the 2023 film The Great Escaper. A baronet, he is also part of an acting dynasty: his maternal grandfather, Guy Standing, was a Hollywood character actor in the 1930s and his mother, Kay Hammond, starred in Blithe Spirit in the West End. Standing lives in central London with his second wife, Sarah (the daughter of the actress Nanette Newman and director Bryan Forbes), whom he married in 1984. He has four children. I'll never forget dancing with Brigitte Bardot in St Tropez in the mid-1960s. I was at a table in a nightclub with my first wife, the late actress Jill Melford, on a summer's evening. And who should be sitting at the adjoining table with friends? The lovely Brigitte, who had shot to fame a few years earlier in the film And God Created Woman. Brigitte suddenly fancied doing the Madison, a dance popular at the time, and invited me to join her. So I had the pleasure of dancing with this pretty young actress. Thankfully Jill was relaxed about it — it was, after all, just the one dance. As a child the war was raging, so my first real trip was being evacuated from London, where I grew up, to Argyll, Scotland, to escape the Doodlebugs raining down on the capital in 1944. We lived on a farm and it was a magical experience. After the conflict ended my brother and I would holiday in the summer at my mother Kay and actor stepfather John Clements's cottage in East Farleigh, Kent, where I spent many happy hours playing cricket on the village green. I got to know New York pretty well when I was appearing with Maggie [Smith] in Private Lives on Broadway in the 1970s. Rex Harrison, an old family friend who looked upon me as a surrogate son, was starring in a Terry Rattigan play down the road so we would meet up every day, wander around Central Park and, after performing, dine out at Elaine's, a famous Upper East Side restaurant patronised by actors and authors, in the evening. Some of my fondest holiday memories are doing what Rex jokingly referred to as 'high comedy swimming' — larking about in his outdoor pool with him and his pals — at the beautiful villa he owned outside Portofino. He much preferred living in sunny Italy to cloudy England. I also had some memorable adventures with my great friend and fellow actor Peter O'Toole, who invited me to stay with him at his home in the breathtakingly beautiful Connemara, Co Galway, in the 1970s. We had a hilarious time, smoked a lot of weed, usually got back to his house around 4am from the local pub, and played snooker until dawn. We would then sleep until lunchtime and have a can of sardines for lunch. Happy days! We subsequently toured Australia together for six weeks in a ghastly play, Dead Eyed Dicks, emptying theatres. On the plus side, we got to play a lot of cricket. In the mid-1980s I was cast opposite Robert Wagner in the US television drama series Lime Street, so my [second] wife Sarah and I moved to Los Angeles where we spent the next seven years. Being in LA was like being on one long holiday and the sun was out every day. I already knew the city reasonably well having been in films like King Rat which was shot there. Every now and then I'd have lunch or dinner at the Beverly Hills Hotel or the Bel-Air, my favourite LA hotel, with a mate of mine, like the actor George Segal. And I saw a lot of LA Dodgers baseball games too. When my family and I returned to the UK in the early 1990s we had a couple of lovely summer holidays in Cornwall. Someone very sweetly lent us a cottage in Fowey, overlooking the bay; I thought it was terribly important that the children learnt how marvellous an English seaside holiday could be, even if the weather sometimes disappointed. I'm also very fond of India, and the state of Rajasthan in particular, which I've visited several times with Sarah over the years. I've usually stayed with my great friend Shatru, a scion of the Deogarh family, and his charming wife Bhavna, who together have transformed their magnificent ancestral home into Dev Shree Deogarh, now one of the finest resort hotels in the country. Going there is a wonderful, life-affirming experience. I don't travel so much these days but I suspect that a visit to Paris could soon be on the cards since my daughter and her husband are threatening to move there. If they do, I'll happily jump on a Eurostar and visit them, and pop into an art galley or two while I'm in Standing's latest film, The Great Escaper, is streaming online. He is a supporter of the Motor Neurone Disease Association ( In our weekly My Hols interview, famous faces — from the worlds of film, sport, politics, and more — share their travel stories from childhood to the present day. Read more My Hols interviews here

Princes' cousin among objectors to Stella McCartney's Highland home
Princes' cousin among objectors to Stella McCartney's Highland home

Times

time13-07-2025

  • Times

Princes' cousin among objectors to Stella McCartney's Highland home

The fashion designer Stella McCartney's plan to build a £5 million modernist mansion in the Highlands has not endeared her to many of her new neighbours in Scotland. The concrete building has, so far, been described as a 'monstrous carbuncle' and a 'blot on the landscape' — and she also has an adversary in Celia Woodhouse, who is Princess Diana's niece. In a letter to Highland council in 2023, Woodhouse described the proposals as 'monstrous' and 'an eyesore in a stunning and untouched area' and lamented the use of concrete rather than Scottish stone in construction. She added: 'Finally, we must protect the natural habitats in the area. There is an otter holt in the proposed area, which would be demolished in the bridling of this monstrous house. I firmly object to this planning application.' An otter holt is the name for a den that the protected species uses for resting and sleeping. Woodhouse, whose mother is Diana's sister Lady Sarah McCorquodale, has a connection to isolated areas on the west coast of Scotland. Her late grandmother Frances Shand Kydd spent her latter years largely in seclusion on the Isle of Seil, near Oban, in Argyll and Bute. When Woodhouse got married in 2018 in Stoke Rochford, Lincolnshire, she wore the Spencer tiara, which Diana also wore on her wedding day in 1981. Prince Harry and Meghan attended the Woodhouse wedding, a month after their own. Last month, McCartney, 53, who runs her eponymous fashion brand, and her husband, Alasdhair Willis, 55, chief creative officer at Adidas, condemned misinformation about their planned home. The couple, who have four children, said: 'The constant mistruths that have been associated with this application are deeply disappointing and, in a number of cases, intentionally inaccurate. Unlike many of the homes in the area, this is not a holiday home. It is a house we will live in and contribute to the local community.' They claimed that planning permission had existed on the site for 25 years through a previous owner for a property that was never built. Willis earlier told the Press and Journal newspaper they considered the four or five-bedroom house, to be sited on a plot known as Commando Rock, to be part of their 'life plan'. The property would boast large glazed walls and a cantilevered section for the principal bedroom, offering expansive views of Loch Ailort. It is claimed the green roof, seeded with grasses and heather, and ochre-coloured steel would help it blend with the landscape. Brown & Brown Architects confirmed that all trees would be kept but the Woodland Trust maintained its objection to the plans, citing the 'potential for adverse ecological impacts on ancient woodland'. Andrew Brown, of the Highland-based architects, previously wrote to the planning department saying there was no evidence of an otter holt. However, a survey by the environmental consultants EnviroCentre found 'potential holt sites for otters present' and many objectors claim a breeding site is in the vicinity. Eoghan Carmichael, who has lived in nearby Glenuig for 48 years, said many locals have concerns about the 'huge' homes built by some of the objectors to McCartney's plan. He said: 'Not everybody here objects, but they do object to some of the houses that some of the objectors have built and are quite happy for Stella's development to go ahead.' Asked when the application is likely to be debated or decided, Highland council said: 'As the Highland council is the planning authority, it is not appropriate for the local authority to provide comment on a planning application.' A representative for the couple said they had no further comment. Asked about her views on the plans, Woodhouse, 36, a school secretary in Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, said she had 'no more comment' to make.

Karen Gillan says her wedding at Scots castle was a bit of a 's**tshow' although her Big Day there was still 'great'
Karen Gillan says her wedding at Scots castle was a bit of a 's**tshow' although her Big Day there was still 'great'

Daily Mail​

time05-07-2025

  • Daily Mail​

Karen Gillan says her wedding at Scots castle was a bit of a 's**tshow' although her Big Day there was still 'great'

Karen Gillan has described the run-up to her lavish wedding at a Scots castle as a 's**tshow,' saying the venue was like 'Fawlty Towers'. The Scots actress married American actor Nick Kocher, 39, at Castle Toward, near Dunoon, Argyll, in May 2022. However, while she said the big day was 'amazing', she reeled off a list of issues she claims she encountered at the 19th century mansion, including a lack of hot water and cooking facilities, loose door handles and exposed wires. Ms Gillan, 37, also recounted an awkward moment when she praised the owners' relationship – only to later learn they were going through a 'bitter divorce'. The Inverness-born former Doctor Who star told the Comedy Bang Bang podcast: 'I got married in a castle and, let me tell you, it was a sh**show. But it was amazing. 'The days leading to the wedding were sh**shows.' Entrepreneur Denice Purdie and her husband Keith Punler paid £1.2 million for Castle Toward in 2015 with plans to turn it into a five-star wedding and events venue. However, Ms Gillan's comments suggest there were still snagging issues by the time of her wedding. The event, which was attended by around 75 A-list guests, took place at Castle Toward with Gillan later sharing an image of her taken inside the venue wearing her wedding dress She said: 'No, the wedding itself was great, but just everything went wrong in the lead-up that could possibly go wrong. 'This lovely couple were showing us around the castle a year prior. They were like, 'We're going to do it up. It's going to be lovely'. It was a construction site. 'Then four days before the wedding, it was still a construction site. 'My wedding planner went in and she just saw one man with a hammer called Keith. He was like, 'I'm sorry, Gina. I should have sorted this out'. I was just like, 'what's going to happen?'' Ms Gillan, who gave birth to her first child, Clementine, in January, revealed she had initially planned for some of her nearest and dearest to stay in Castle Toward in the run-up to the ceremony, but that became impossible. 'There was no hot water. There was nowhere to cook,' she said. 'People were meant to live in the castle for a few days. There were like wires coming out of the walls and also this beautiful couple that had hosted us – and we were like, 'We would just want to end up like you' – have gone through a bitter divorce since.' However, Ms Gillan has fond memories of the day itself, saying: 'It was genuinely the most incredible time. Everyone said it was their favourite wedding that they've ever been to. But it was like Fawlty Towers, like door handles were coming off and things were going wrong, but it added to it. 'I think it just makes you go like, abandon all these expectations that you had and just sort of roll with it.' Responding to Ms Gillan's comments, Mr Punler said the castle's restoration was set back by the pandemic with 'construction costs ballooning' and a 'shortage of labour'. However, he insisted he and his staff put in a mammoth effort to get the venue ready for the event 'right up till the last minute'. He said: 'Yes it's true, there were a few snagging matters that we had to address in the lead-up. 'These are inevitable in any large-scale construction project, and for sure it would have been easier to celebrate the completion of the restoration with a smaller, low-key 'soft' event than to play host to 75 A-list guests for four nights.' Mr Punler added that, despite the 'odd hiccup', the wedding day was faultless and he has since invited the couple and their daughter back to the castle.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store