The Corner Café

The Corner Café on Lambeth Road (with an address actually in Hercules Road, which runs perpendicular to Lambeth Road) is where Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott meet Vanessa Ekwensi’s boyfriend, Oliver Bargate, in chapter 40 of Lethal White.

Oliver is a forensic pathologist; “Strike had chosen the Corner Café on Lambeth Road for its proximity to the forensics laboratory where Oliver Bargate worked.”

When Robin arrives at the café, Strike is smoking a cigarette outside. Strike grinds out the cigarette on the wall, and they both enter the café, “which smelled pleasantly of frying food.”

Robin orders coffee and two bacon rolls for Strike. “‘One,’ Strike corrected her. … ‘Trying to lose weight.’”

“He knew that he could have changed his mind now and ordered five bacon rolls, and she would simply have grinned and handed them over. This thought made him particularly affectionate towards her as she joined him at the table in her muddy jeans.”

Later, Oliver arrives and they interview him about the forensic evidence collected in the Chiswell case.

Fancy a coffee and a bacon roll (or five) at the Corner Café? You can find it on Google Maps here:

Afterward, you could take a short walk down Lambeth Road (under the railway bridge) to see the forensics laboratory where Oliver works.