Plans have been submitted to Greenwich Council to officially turn a much-loved micropub into a beauty salon.

The Plum Tree, on Plumstead Common Road, opened in 2019 and quickly became a local institution, winning the Campaign for Real Ale’s Greenwich pub of the year in 2023.

But after the owners opened a delicatessen next door, the business began to struggle, they said on social media, and the both the micropub and deli closed at the start of the year.

The interior has already been stripped out and turned into a beauty salon, but a retrospective planning application for the change has now been filed to Greenwich Council.

The SE London branch of the Campaign for Real Ale has asked its members to object on the grounds that no case has been made that the pub was unviable. Last year its members gathered in The Plum Tree to mark the branch’s 50th anniversary.

Men with a birthday cake
Camra members joined the team behind the Plum Tree micropub to mark the branch’s anniversary last year. Image: SE London Camra

Micropubs are usually small pubs set up in former shop units that emphasise real ale. They spread across the country from Kent after the first one opened in Herne, near Canterbury, in 2005.

The Plum Tree was the third to open in the borough after The Long Pond in Eltham and the River Ale House in east Greenwich. Two more have opened since then: The Berry & Barrel, also in Eltham, and The Bat & Ball in Mottingham. There is also one across the Lewisham border, The Shirker’s Rest in New Cross.

To see the application or to comment on it, visit the Greenwich Council planning website.

📩 Follow The Greenwich Wire on Bluesky, Facebook, LinkedIn or Threads. You can also sign up for WhatsApp alerts – or subscribe to our emails through the blue box above.