Leeds city centre nostalgia: Memories of a pub with a theatrical atmosphere

The Wrens is opposite The Grand Theatre & Opera House and for many years used to offer accommodation to the stars of the stage.

Research revealed that watering hole was named after Alfred Edwin Wren who ran the hostelry on the corner of Merrion Street and New Briggate as Wren’s Exchange Dining Rooms from 1876 to 1889.

Yet for years the pub signs which showed pictures of Britain’s smallest bird. That changed in May 1993 when they were replaced with a portrait of the founder.

"But try as we might we have been unable to come up with a photograph of portrait of Alfred Wren,” reflected Keith Prime who at the time had run the pub for 14 years.

"After spending many months searching for a likeness of Wren we decided to depict him in the former of a silhouette showing a typical Victorian gentlemen, complete with top hat.”

The origins of the pub’s name was discovered by former licensee Harry Burgoyne’s wife Jean. They ran the pub in the 1960s.

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It was not officially known as The Wrens until 1901 – before that it was a simple, unnamed beer house, which had been run by a series of beer retailers and landlords. It apparently pre-dates the Grand Theatre by some 40 years, which, if true, would put its date of building at 1838.