Bulldozers had sheared away the wall of the 1920s west London pub, with its distinctive tiled signage, to reveal the fully stocked bar and darts trophies still on display.
“People said it was impossible,” said Polly Robertson, a leading member of the Rebuild the Carlton Tavern campaign.
It is a day that will be celebrated by England’s 33,305 pubs, but by none more keenly than at the Carlton in Maida Vale.
The partially demolished Carlton Tavern in late April 2015, when the local campaign to have it restored began.
Robertson and 5,300 other locals, including several local councillors, mobilised to persuade Westminster council to act.
It ordered the owners, CTLX, to rebuild the Carlton brick by brick.
“They said it would be too difficult to do, but we had an answer for that,” Robertson said. »