Meet the man behind a London Underground-style map featuring a staggering 618 Leeds pubs and clubs

Rothwell resident Steve has spent thousands of hours creating pub maps of towns and cities across the country, and has developed a cult following over the years, with thousands of his maps being snapped up by pub enthusiasts across Leeds and beyond.

Steve’s latest creation – his first pub map since the Covid-19 pandemic – contains 618 bars, pubs and nightclubs located all over Leeds. And this time, he did it all from scratch.

The 48-year-old, who makes the maps as his main creative hobby, said: “To the untrained eye, it looks like the previous ones, but I have completely rebuilt the map from nothing, just to make things more standardised.

"It’s more editable, and I have checked the status of every place to see if they are all still open.”

As someone who has been updating his maps for nearly a decade, Steve will have seen all sorts of bars and pubs come and go in and around Leeds.

“In terms of the areas, it certainly ebbs and flows,” he said. “Greek Street has had a big resurgence, of course, and Merrion Street is now densely-packed with places.

"It’s surprising and upsetting, even, to see some places go, though. The Victoria Hotel has a great interior, and that was a big thing for Leeds.”

Steve’s maps were first featured in the Yorkshire Evening Post nearly a decade ago.

“There have been a few thousand of these sold over the years,” he added. “When the first one came out in 2013 and it featured in the paper, and it was like my phone was on fire, not with phone calls, but with PayPal alerts telling me people had bought them. It was amazing.”

Over the years, Steve has added more than 40 pub maps of different areas of the UK to his roster, as well as an historical map of Leeds pubs, which looks at some of the watering holes lost throughout the years.

"For me, it was a blast from the past,” he added. “When I was 18, I went to lots of places that have since closed down. When I was researching the historic map, I thought ‘oh! I forgot about that!’."

So, as someone who knows more than most about the pubs and bars of Leeds, where is Steve’s favourite place to go?

"One place that always springs to mind is Aire Bar,” he said. “I like the vaulted ceiling. In the summer it’s absolutely brilliant being on the riverside balcony.

"They also have one of my maps on the wall, but that’s got nothing to do with it!”

But Steve is not one to shirk from criticism – and he wants to continue to update the map as time goes on.

"I’m still asking for people’s input,” he said. “Any suggestions of anything to add, remove or change. I now have a large format printer, so I can print them off myself. It means I can make changes on the fly.”

A3 sized maps are available for £12.50, while larger maps are £15. The maps can be viewed or purchased at his website.