GAVIN AITCHISON reckons that The Hop in Fossgate has been well and truly worth the wait.

STAND at the centre of The Hop, facing away from the street, and you wouldn’t think you were in a pub.

The high atrium-style ceiling, the raised stage and the vast pizza oven at the end of the room scream “trendy restaurant”, not “boozer”. Try one of the stone-baked pizzas, and the pretence continues.

They are seriously impressive, good enough to compete with the best but served simply on makeshift plates and pre-sliced, for grazing. Crisp bases support an array of authentic Italian toppings, with something to suit every taste.

Turn around 180 degrees though, step back up to the bar area, and The Hop changes instantly. Now, the focus is unmistakeably on the beer.

Twenty-one hand-pulls and fonts stand proudly on a long sweeping bar; fridges showcase fine American bottles; topical quotes and lyrics from Frank Zappa, Edgar Allan Poe and an old prohibition song adorn a beautifully-mirrored wall; vast barrels rest above the front door; and a blackboard alongside the bar displays the sort of beer menu that leaves enthusiasts salivating.

It’s fair to say that The Hop, Ossett Brewery’s new outlet in Fossgate, has been well and truly worth the wait.

Directly opposite The Blue Bell, one of York’s most historic pubs, The Hop is an exciting and innovative venue at the opposite end of the spectrum – a young pretender on the old master’s doorstep. At the start of the 1900s, Fossgate boasted more than 30 pubs, but none can ever have been as good as this.

Ossett has spent £300,000 converting Leila’s Tearoom (previously Fellini’s Italian restaurant), following the success of its Hops in Leeds, Wakefield and Sheffield, and the end result is stunning. It’s a pub first and foremost but it’s also going to be a vibrant live music and comedy venue, the stage in the back room well placed to hold captive a large audience.

The pizzas will keep drinkers in longer but also draw a new crowd, and the renovation itself is an example of York at its very best – marrying the ancient and the modern; embracing history but using it to create something new and valuable rather than wrapping it in cotton wool.

The building, at 11-12 Fossgate, is an unusual one inside and out. It was built in 1898 and was run as a fishmonger’s by William Henry Waudby 100 or so years ago. The top of the façade still displays his initials in stone, along with the York crest and a German eagle, and the interior walls still consist of the intricate glazed brickwork he enjoyed in the early 1900s. Ossett have recreated the colour scheme from those tiles for their ceiling and also added a matching mosaic floor to complement it.

To really appreciate the detail though, you need to visit during the day. Since the pub opened two weeks ago, it has been consistently busy in the evenings, and if you visit on a Friday or a Saturday you’ll scarcely be able to see the floor or walls through the happy hordes.

And as for the beer? What’s not to like?! Manager Tom Baker has brought together a fantastic and varied range in keg, cask and bottle. There are four ales from Ossett’s core range (Silver King, Big Red, Blonde and Excelsior) and a rotating selection along the rest of the bar, including some from Ossett’s subsidiary breweries such as Fernandes.

Early highlights have included BG Wai-iti from Mallinson’s and Brown Cow’s Captain Oates, but my own stand-out has been Flash Flood from Phoenix Brewery in Heywood near Rochdale. It’s a pale, bittersweet ale with a hay-like colour and a crisp hop taste that went beautifully with a sausage and mushroom pizza on Wednesday night. In a city that suffers its fair share of flash floods here was one to truly savour, in a venue that already looks like a new powerhouse in York’s beer scene.

• For an excellent piece on the history of The Hop building (the source for some of the detail above) visit www.yorkstories.co.uk/blog/2013/08/11/from-fish-to-fine-ale-on-fossgate/