Councillors will discuss whether to grant permission next week
By Victoria Munro

Signature Brew’s Joyce op de Beer, left, and Paulina Cudek, right (credit John Moore)

A popular Blackhorse Lane brewery can now serve drinks until the early morning three nights a week.

On 1st December, Signature Brew asked Waltham Forest Council to extend its hours to 1am on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays and midnight on all other nights.

The brewery and venue is located on what’s dubbed the “Blackhorse Brewery Mile”, also home to venues like Truman Brewery, Wild Card and Exale.

After considering their application, Waltham Forest councillors chose to grant permission for the change.

Signature Brew was set up in 2011 by two friends “sick of drinking rubbish beer at gigs” and bears the motto “brewed with music”.

During lockdown, they had massive success with their “pub in a box” service, which offered a selection of beers, snacks, glasses and a Spotify playlist.

However, not everyone was ecstatic about the brewery’s plans to open later, with close neighbour Sherief Awad writing to the council with noise concerns.

In an email to the licensing committee, he wrote that he and fellow residents already “experience excessive noise late at night from customers leaving neighbouring breweries.”

He asked them to ensure the brewery stopped letting customers leave via Hookers Road at night as “the noise echoes and it is causing real distress”.

At the hearing last week, a representative for the brewery said they would hire a security guard to point customers the right way when leaving at the end of the night.

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