Stylish new look for outside bar at Shropshire hotel
A new open-air bar at a Shropshire hotel has been given an artistic look, thanks to a local tattoo artist.
Lucy Rose Williams has transformed the new Bridge Bar at the Ellesmere Hotel with a mural featuring an historic link to the pub and cartoon characters from The Simpsons.
The talented artist was asked to decorate the outside bar by the owners of the hotel, Mark Griffiths and his partner, Sandra.
Lucy, 25, is an apprentice tattooist with Ellesmere Ink. So a mural was on a far bigger scale to the intricate drawings she usually does.
She said: “I was asked if I’d be happy to create something and of course I was absolutely thrilled to.
"Being a new tattoo artist I sent over loads of design ideas for Mark and Sandra to choose from. They wanted to incorporate the history of the hotel and how it started.
“Over 200 years ago the hotel played an important part in the building of the Llangollen canal.”
The mural features the Chirk Aqueduct, built by Thomas Telford as part of the Llangollen canal which was built to connect Ellesmere with a new port on the Dee Estuary named Ellesmere Port.
But the canal never reached its destination as Telford could not get across the hills above Llangollen.
Farmers and landowners, who wanted to export their products via the canal, met in the hotel in 1792, to agree to raise funds for the construction.
Sandra said they were absolutely delighted with the mural.
“The new outside Bridge bar has already been popular and the mural is brilliant,” she said.
