P L Chadwick, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Eat and drink · Fairford
The Eight Bells, Fairford
An Arkell's pub on East End in Fairford, reputed to be about 300 years old, with a garden, a dining room, a Thursday quiz and live music on Friday nights.
Dog-friendly · Family-friendly
A town local with a dining room, a garden and a car park, a few minutes' walk east of the Market Place. Dogs and families are welcome; Friday night is music night, so come earlier in the week for a quiet pint.
- Good: Dogs welcome in the bar and the restaurant
- Good: Garden or patio, and a car park
- Good: Cask Marque accredited for its beer
- Good: Quiz every Thursday from 8.30pm
- Worth knowing: Live music on Friday nights, so not the night for a quiet meal
- Worth knowing: No website of its own and no published kitchen hours
About
The Eight Bells is an Arkell's pub on East End in Fairford, about 500 metres east of the Market Place. Arkell's, the Swindon family brewery, says the building is reputed to be about 300 years old. Kassy and Tim Mawer are the hosts.
It serves pub food and has a restaurant or dining room as well as the bar, with a garden or patio outside and a car park. Dogs are welcome in both the bar and the restaurant, families are always welcome, and the beer is Cask Marque accredited. The quiz is on Thursdays from 8.30pm, and Friday night is live music.
It opens at 3pm from Monday to Friday and at noon at weekends, and stays open until midnight, or 2am on Fridays and Saturdays. Neither the pub nor the brewery publishes kitchen hours, so ring before you plan a meal round it. It is a short walk from St Mary's Church and its glass, and from the start of the river and lakes walk from Fairford.
Opening hours and season
| Monday | 15:00 to 00:00 |
|---|---|
| Tuesday | 15:00 to 00:00 |
| Wednesday | 15:00 to 00:00 |
| Thursday | 15:00 to 00:00 |
| Friday | 15:00 to 02:00 |
| Saturday | 12:00 to 02:00 |
| Sunday | 12:00 to 00:00 |
Opens 3pm Monday to Friday and noon at weekends, until late. Kitchen hours not published. Quiz on Thursdays from 8.30pm; live music on Friday nights.
The details
- Features
- Garden or terrace · Parking · Real ale · Restaurant · Live music · Dogs inside
- History
- Reputed to be about 300 years old
- Parking
- The pub has its own car park.
Photos
The pub sign in 2002 Photo: Ray Bird, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Location
Places to stay nearby
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The Bull Hotel
Inn · Fairford
A Grade II listed coaching inn on Fairford's Market Place with 21 bedrooms, an Arkell's house since 1973, and a private stretch of the River Coln for fishing.
Family-friendly · Wedding venues
Verified Nov 2026
-
The Lakes by YOO
Self-catering · Lechlade-on-Thames
An 850-acre lakeside estate at Coln Park, west of Lechlade, with rooms, apartments, cabins and houses sleeping up to 14, a spa with a 17-metre pool, and a lakeside bar and kitchen.
Family-friendly · Hot tubs
Verified Nov 2026
-
The Keepers Arms
Inn · Coln St Aldwyns
A family-run free house in Quenington with four adults-only bed and breakfast rooms above the pub, independent real ales and dogs welcome.
Dog-friendly
Verified Nov 2026
Nearby walks, places and things to do
- 7a Coffee Shop, Fairford 0.3 km away
- The Plough Inn, Fairford 0.4 km away
- Lynwood & Co, Fairford 0.4 km away
- The Bull Hotel 0.5 km away
Sights nearby
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St Mary's Church, Fairford
Sight · Church · Fairford
Fairford's wool church, rebuilt in the 1490s by the merchant John Tame, holds 28 windows of glass made about 1500 to 1515, which the parish calls the only complete set of late medieval glass in any parish church in the country. Grade I; open daily, free.
-
St Swithin's Church, Quenington
Sight · Church · Cirencester and the Coln Valley
Quenington's Norman parish church in the Coln valley, recorded by 1100, with two richly carved Norman doorways: the Harrowing of Hell over the north door and, over the south, what may be the earliest carving of the Coronation of the Virgin. Grade I.
-
Knights Hospitallers' Gateway, Quenington
Sight · Historic building · Cirencester and the Coln Valley
The fourteenth-century gatehouse of the preceptory the Knights Hospitallers founded at Quenington in about 1193, partly rebuilt in the early sixteenth century, beside St Swithin's church. Grade I; on private land, seen from Church Road.
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St John the Baptist, Coln St Aldwyns
Sight · Church · Coln St Aldwyns
Coln St Aldwyns' parish church: a late Norman doorway of chevrons, a demon carved over a blocked window, a two-tier chandelier of about 1767, and windows remembering the two John Kebles, father and son, who served here. Grade II*.