https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-66434719

What’s going on here then? A few weeks after sale of the pub (??), It catches fire, the road to it is blocked so the fire brigade can’t get there, loads of soil is found at the scene and 2 days later it’s been flattened and no-one knows by whom (before the cause of fire has been established)..

New owners want a big house on a nice plot?
Disgruntled ex employee seeks revenge?
Ghosts?
Complete coincidence?

A band called Gasoline and Matches were booked to play on the night it burned down too, obviously cancelled a few months prior as the pub shut/was sold.

It’s just down the road from me, it definitely seems a bit suspicious. I was surprised to see it wasn’t actually a listed building given its novelty.

Fixed – “New owners want a big houseS on a nice plot”

Expect the planning application next!

See also Hardy’s Well in Manchester. Site owned by a developer. Left to ruin, second fire kills the building, developer stands in front on ruins smiling.

Listed buildings need more protection.

Funny how the developers have funds to sort out the issues in the immediate aftermath of a fire…

Certainly something crooked going on

There would have been significant local resistance to any planning application so even though it wasn’t listed the new owners would have struggled to get permission to knock it down.

This smells like the fishiest fish in fish town harbour.

I hope an investigation is done properly, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the new owner is a friend of someone that could make that go away and that will be it.

It’s a real shame, it’s not far from me,  I’ve never been personally but it’s very famous, I’m also shocked that it wasn’t listed, I’m also shocked that it wasn’t turning enough of a profit for the brewery to keep it. There were work outings there from a couple of places I’ve worked.

There seems to be far too many suspicious fires on buildings like these, I’d like to think there was a law you could use against the owners to make them rebuild as was but I’m buggered if I can think of anything workable.

It was a pub I could walk to, but the road in was such a shithole I rarely did. Such a shame, it was the kind of place that you’d feel pissed up in before you’d had a pint. Would have been a massive hit at the Black Country museum.

Road blocked on night of fire (we could see the smoke) which adds to the suspicion of foul play…

Exactly  housing.

Burn it down, so can claim/ declare it is derelict. It bypasses loads of local planning rules and time-based limits for change of use etc.

Total **** (London based natch) who bought a pub near me did exactly the same (great views over the Derwent valley, large car park provides space for 2 more houses to be built on).

The Gov can’t be arsed to close the loophole as it allows their London property investor cronies to ride roughshod over planning consent.

There’s always hope..

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/mar/21/rising-from-the-rubble-london-pub-rebuilt-brick-by-brick-after-bulldozing

Wasn’t there a case of this in the last couple of years where the developer was made to rebuild it?

Edit – Ah ^ the one in the above post /Edit

Around here the site would sit derelict for several years until eventually the property developer who plans to put houses on it is seen as the saviour because it sorts the eyesore!

No smoke with out fire……

Does sound off though.

I also used to live pretty close to it.
Such a shame it’s been lost.
Really unique building.

What I don’t understand is why anyone would go to the trouble of burning it down to build a house there.

It’s between a landfill site and some industrial wasteland.
There’s not even any view as it’s in the bottom of a small valley that can flood pretty badly.

If houses are built there, what will the subsidence insurance be like…

I thought it suspicious when I heard about the new owner/fire, but not the blocked road and it being bulldozed already.

It’s between a landfill site and some industrial wasteland.

So basically a metaphor for the Black Country as a whole then….. Sounds like it would have made an excellent site for a Black Country museum 😉

Hedge fund lightning

I was surprised to see it wasn’t actually a listed building given its novelty.

The Express & Star reported that it was grade 2 listed.

Regardless of how that fire started, everybody now thinks that it was started deliberately.

I’m relatively local and there’s quite a lot of uproar about it.
I think there’s an acceptance that developers do dodgy things but this seems so blatant. The fire being so close after it was bought, the blocked drive to get there and then the whole site bulldozed within 2 days of the fire being put out.
As a pub, it was always good fun but I can understand the location putting off visitors and it not being viable. A rebuild in The Black Country Museum always seemed like a good idea, but I’m not sure how feasible that would have been.
What the developers might do with the land is a different question, it’s not in a great location and whilst there’s a lot of space for houses it’d take some serious work to make the area appealing. I could see a care home there though, maybe that’s the plan.

It’s a pretty obvious mechanism for removing the pub without any local complaints or legal difficulties.

I have no idea why they want it gone but they’ve done a pretty good job of getting rid of it.

I will be very surprised if there’s a proper investigation and/or legal action but we shall have to wait and see.

There is a local builder/developer round here who buys nice properties which promptly go up in smoke, to the point that when the old school went up the pub sang “Firestarter” when he walked in. He went very red and left sharpish.
Numerous nice individual houses have been replaced by his cookie cutter Executive Des Res’s, council doesn’t seem to care.

<p>Dirt piled to stop travellers from pitching up?</p><p>Copper thieves got into the property and caused a fire?</p><p>Bulldozed early by mistake?</p>

What’s the solution to a disused building that no-one can afford to use for its previous purpose, and for which planning permission is routinely denied for any change of use that’s commercially viable?

There are a few of these near my mum’s house. One is finally getting converted to accommodation (and some small office space too I think) and another couple are just sitting getting more derelict year by year. One has been burnt. Just eyesores.

Similarly, there are dozens of shitty derelict barns in fields round here, that cost a small fortune to convert into unsuitable houses (or a large fortune to make into a slightly more usable house). Wouldn’t it be more sensible to just knock them down and build sensible houses that are pleasant to live in, even if they look a bit different from the outside?

I thought if the structure is unstable it is the Fire Brigade or Council or someone that orders you to knock it down immediately…?

London property investor cronies

Excuse me, I think you’ll find Glasgow, Belfast and Liverpool developers have all been suffering unfortunate incidents where their buildings “go on fire” for decades. Have a look at the Nooks and Crannies column of Private Eye.

The Telegraph reporting that listed status was requested for it shortly before it burnt down

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/08/07/britains-wonkiest-pub-crooked-house-burnt-down-to-be-listed/

One week before the fire on Aug 5, Historic England received a submission from experts requesting that the pub – built in 1765 – be given protection as a listed building, officials from the heritage body told The Telegraph.

The Georgian Group, a campaign organisation of which the King is patron, was also examining the suitability of the site for listed status prior to the “suspicious” fire currently being investigated by police.

Was Muriel Gray visiting the pub?

there was a case of this where i grew up – wanted rid of the grand old seafront hotel for some exec beach front flats.

the place caught fire while the owner was “on holiday abroad”  back in 2006

The ruin stood while they put in application after application for flats.

eventually the council ordered the clean up of the site  and said it would only ever be civic space.

Its now grass land.

recently someone wanted to put a hotel on – combined with a petrol station and coffee shop which was provisionally accepted – then they removed the hotel from the plans. The petrol station and coffee shop was then rejected.

More councils need to act like that but the developers know the councils rarely get a cohesive action together and they will force it through eventually.

At the risk of allegations of libel, as a former insurance claims manager, we’d be crawling all over that.

Obviously accidents happen, sadly we had a fatal house fire round the corner from me over the weekend.

A band called Gasoline and Matches were booked to play on the night it burned down too

I thought this was a joke when I first read it, but it’s not!

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/black-country/band-unfortunate-name-address-awful-27469552

Surely the course of events is so incredibly suspicious that it invites investigation? If you really wanted to get away with flattening it and building something else would it not be better to be a bit more subtle about it?

At the risk of allegations of libel, as a former insurance claims manager, we’d be crawling all over that.

I suspect they have no intention of making an insurance claim. They wanted the land cleared and the building was in the way, this was a cheap way to do so. They’re not doing it to claim insurance money, just to get the building out of way.

More suspicious if they didn’t put an insurance claim in though, isn’t it?

They’re not doing it to claim insurance money, just to get the building out of way.

Whilst obviously if proved after you filled in the paperwork that would add a fraud charge, it’s still not a legit thing to do. You don’t get to deliberately burn your own property down, endangering emergency services lives and (but maybe not in this specific case) other properties and the environmental impact and everybody say, well it was to do with what you like, do you?

lungeFull Member
At the risk of allegations of libel, as a former insurance claims manager, we’d be crawling all over that.
I suspect they have no intention of making an insurance claim. They wanted the land cleared and the building was in the way, this was a cheap way to do so. They’re not doing it to claim insurance money, just to get the building out of way.

As a current insurance Underwriter, it wouldn’t be the first time that I’d been asked to insure a building for full rebuild value that had already been earmarked for demolition. I’ve recently started at a new place and there was a recent bulletin telling people to be aware of this very thing too.

Greedy property developers are cash rich greedy, not necessarily smart.

not independently verified, so pinch of salt etc

Within hours of @StaffsPolice and @StaffsFire leaving The Crooked House at Himley, footage has emerged of a digger moving onto site and quickly demolishing the building.

Credit: Anonymous- Facebook Spotted Russells Hall pic.twitter.com/wxOXXOFsI2

— Paul Dadge (@Dadgey) August 8, 2023

You don’t get to deliberately burn your own property down, endangering emergency services lives and (but maybe not in this specific case) other properties and the environmental impact and everybody say, well it was to do with what you like, do you?

What laws have been broken?

Arson! It’s a crime!

Is it arson if it’s your own property and you intend to destroy it by fire?

Honest question, I don’t know the answer, but I have seen buildings intentionally burned down ahead of clearing sites before.