Wenlock & Essex Islington pub dresses to excess

Throwing on a costume can spice up even the most ordinary activities -- if Wayne Rooney hadn't been wearing that ogre outfit, stomping Ronaldo's nuts would've felt like just another day at the office. Playing dress-up with the boozer, Wenlock and Essex.

Entered through a revolving door, Wenlock's a classic wood-varnished pub that's thrown on a dizzying decor ensemble they say's influenced by "carousel, cabaret, and circus": lighting & paint job befitting an old-timey theatre, Daguerreotypes of Victorian folk, wall-mounted candelabras, Big Top-fonted messages ("Thrills!"), red leather booths, and vintage-style wallpaper depicting ostriches sticking their heads in the sand, presumably in denial that there's alcohol abuse about. The booze is also dizzying, with cocktails from "sahara dry, arctic cold" martini basics to the vodka/creme de mur/cranberry Pontberry, plus beers like Wild Hare, Brooklyn, Veltins Pils, Orval, and the house-brewed Camden Hells, soon to be renamed "Camden". To provide ballast, a Michelin-trained chef is serving up the likes of lamb meatballs, tenderized rump steak w/ hand cut chips, an oak-roast salmon sandwich, and Salt & Pepper Squid -- though there can't be much of that, considering they haven't had a hit since 1993.

To really step out, hit Wenlock's attached 80s-style club, "Satan's Circus", where a colour-changing disco floor pulsates beneath a mirrored ceiling, and further disorienting illumination's provided by a neon "strip light" that depicts a woman undressing in four stages...oh, wait, that's no woman, it's Orlando Bloom! What has Wayne Rooney done to his nuts?!