Pressure Drop Brewery and Taproom
Three days a week the brewery clears its floor and pours whatever came off the tanks that week, in the room where they brewed it.
Why go
Pressure Drop started in Hackney and moved to Tottenham in 2017, onto the same industrial estate as Beavertown (Good Beer Hunting). The taproom is the brewery, five minutes from Tottenham Hale station on the edge of the marshes, and it opens Friday evening and both weekend afternoons.
The beer to start with is Pale Fire, a 4.8 percent hazy pale, which is what the brewery is known for. On the current list alongside it: Understanding Whole Systems, an annual Citra NEIPA at 7.4 percent, and an Export India Porter at 5.5 percent brewed with Newbarns of Edinburgh.
The collaboration record is the best evidence available on how other brewers rate this one. In 2018 Verdant, then Cornwall's most-hyped brewery, brewed a New England pale with Pressure Drop and then took over their vacated Hackney arch to open a joint ten-tap taproom. Verdant co-founder Adam Robertson at the time: "We know that selling our beer as fresh as can be in a great venue can only be a win for both us and the drinkers." Eight years later a different brewery, in a different country, is on a current Pressure Drop label.
Be clear about the format. CAMRA's North London branch record says "Cask Ale not available", which is accurate and is how the place is built: this is craft keg, poured cold, at source.
Order this / avoid
- Order: Pale Fire, drunk about twenty feet from the tank it came off. Understanding Whole Systems if this year's batch is still pouring. The Newbarns Export India Porter for the far end of the range. Otherwise ask what came off the tanks this week.
- Avoid: Monday to Thursday, when the brewery is working and the doors are shut. Arriving after 8pm at the weekend. Turning up expecting a handpull.
What locals & experts say
- CAMRA, North London branch, record updated 19 July 2026, reproducing the brewery's own description:
Every Friday we clear out the brewery and open our doors. We'll have all of our freshest craft keg beers pouring for you to enjoy right in the heart of our brewery based on the edge of the Tottenham Marshes near the River Lea.
The branch also records the format flatly:Cask Ale not available.
1 - Good Beer Hunting, 8 June 2018, on the history and on who wanted to work with them:
Pressure Drop established its Hackney Brewery in 2012, before expanding to a new site in Tottenham, North London on the same estate as Beavertown in 2017.
Verdant's Adam Robertson, on taking their old Hackney arch:When Graham mentioned the former home of Pressure Drop on Bohemia Place, we knew that this was an opportunity not to be missed.
2 - The gap, stated plainly. No critic and no beer writer has published an assessment of the beer poured at this taproom, and the drinker ratings on Untappd and RateBeer were not read either. The rung reflects that, and one good read would move it.
Good to know
- Where: Unit 6, Lockwood Estate, Mill Mead Road, Tottenham Hale N17 9QP. Five minutes from Tottenham Hale on the Victoria line. Beavertown is on the same estate.
- Timing: Friday 5pm to 9pm. Saturday and Sunday noon to 8pm. Closed the rest of the week.
- Booking: walk in. The taproom does take table reservations and event bookings by email, which is a change from the older CAMRA text saying it takes none.
- Beer: craft keg only, poured in the brewery, with the tanks in the room. No cask.
- Food: Yard Sale Pizza delivers to the tables, with rotating pop-up vendors alongside.
- Space: indoor and outdoor seating, some of it covered, and the venue says it works for large groups.
- Hygiene: FSA rating 5, Haringey, inspected 17 October 2024, FHRSID 1035190.4
- Sites: one taproom under this name. The brewery's old Hackney arch on Bohemia Place became The Experiment, a ten-tap joint venture with Verdant that opened in July 2018. That is a different address and a different business arrangement.
Verdict
could-visit — Worth an afternoon if you are already going to Tottenham Hale, and there is a good reason to be, because Beavertown sits on the same industrial estate. Pressure Drop moved here from Hackney in 2017 and opens the brewery floor three days a week to pour whatever is freshest off the tanks, which is the whole proposition: Pale Fire at 4.8 percent about twenty feet from where it was made, an annual Citra NEIPA at 7.4, and an Export India Porter brewed with Newbarns of Edinburgh. Keg only, and CAMRA's North London branch says so plainly, which is a description of the format rather than a complaint. The company they keep is the strongest thing on the record: Verdant collaborated with them on a beer in 2018 and then opened a shared ten-tap taproom in their old Hackney arch, and Newbarns is on a current label eight years later. Brewers who could work with anyone keep working with this one. What is missing is anyone tasting it and writing it down. No critic and no beer writer carries a verdict on the beer here, Untappd was not read, and a rung above this needs one of those two things. Yard Sale Pizza comes to the table, the outdoor seating holds a group, and it shuts at eight.