The Crow's Nest Bar to open in Clayton-le-Moors this month

Oliver Houghton, 30, and his dad John, 56, will be opening the Crow’s Nest Bar in Clayton-le-Moors at the end of the month, with the hope of bringing “something a bit different” to the town.

The pair have worked together for years renovating properties for a letting agent, and stumbled across the site for the Crow’s Nest when they were changing the lock on the former site of Smokehouse 138 in Barnes Square.

The Crow's Nest will open at the end of July (Image: Oliver Houghton)

Oliver said: “One day we got a lock change and opened the front door, and there was a bar in front of us.

"We both said ‘oh wow, I didn’t know that was there.’ It almost looks like a terraced house from the outside, it’s easy to miss.

“We enquired about it and thought let’s just go for it. We’ve been doing it up for about two-and-a-half months now getting it ready.

“We’ve always wanted to do something a bit different and we’ve always fancied ourselves opening a bar. It’s a bit of a dream of ours. We looked at a few in the past and nothing came of it. We sort of forgot all about it.”

The bar will serve cocktails and a range of lagers, pale ales, and IPAs (Image: Oliver Houghton)

The bar will focus primarily on cocktails but also serve a range of lagers, pale ales, and IPAs.

Oliver said: “We’re going to try and cover all areas in terms of drinks – we don’t want people coming in and thinking there’s nothing for them.”

He added: “We also have a kitchen. Before we started here it did food in the past and it did quite well, so we are thinking about doing food in the future, depending on how well we do with just drinks.”

Oliver and John are hoping the bar will became a key place for people in the town to go and socialise.

They are looking to add board games, possibly an arcade machine, and they hope to host live music.

The bar is located in Barnes Square (Image: Oliver Houghton)

Oliver said: “We’ve got a lot of pubs in Clayton but we don’t really have a bar – somewhere for those who aren’t too young, but somewhere for those in their 30s and 40s.

“We want to do something a bit different and have it as a social place. We want to create somewhere different for Clayton and bring a bit more nightlife to it.”

Current opening hours are expected to be 5pm to 12am on Fridays, 12pm to 12am on Saturdays, and 3pm to 10pm on Sundays.

The pair are hoping to open over the weekend of Saturday, July 28, and Sunday 29, at their space in Barnes Square.