The claim
Lorry sits behind the royal palace at the corner of Parkveien and Hegdehaugsveien, in a block of 1874 that began life with a grocer's and wine shop on the ground floor. Two hundred and seven paintings cover the walls, many of them left by artists who worked in the booths and paid in pictures. Twelve beers are poured from the bar, and the doors stay open until half past three.
What the records show
Lorry's own site says the house has a history reaching right back to the 1870s and that the same family has run it for more than sixty years, through three generations. The 1870s belongs to the building rather than to the serving. Oslo Byleksikon, the city's own encyclopedia, describes Parkveien 12 as a three-storey corner block of 1874 at Hegdehaugsveien, originally with a grocer's and wine merchant's shop on the ground floor, built up further in 1897; it then says that Ringnes brewery took the property over in 1901 and that the restaurant era began there, under the name West Café og Restaurant, with the name Lorry adopted in 1940. The house was restored in 1998 after a fire. A shop selling wine to carry home is not a drinking house, so the first record of drink served on these premises is the brewery's house of 1901, and a building of the claimed age with the drinking recorded a generation later is what this grade means. Visit Oslo's listing, repeated across the Visit Norway sites, says instead that the place has served artists and writers since 1887; nothing traced supports that year, and the encyclopedia's account of a wine shop until 1901 is against it. A reader can be served without eating: the kitchen's menu is separate, twelve beers are poured from the ground-floor bar, and the published hours run to half past three in the morning from Tuesday to Saturday, with the walls carrying two hundred and seven works by more than seventy artists, many of whom paid in pictures. The doors were checked on 9 October 2026: the house's own site publishes hours of eleven in the morning until half past three the following morning from Tuesday to Saturday, and takes table bookings.
| Year | What | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 1870 | Claimed founding | The pub |
| c.1874 | Present building | Oslo Byleksikon, the city's own encyclopedia |
| 1901 | First record of a drinking house here | Oslo Byleksikon, on Ringnes taking the house in 1901 |
What to look for inside
- Serving from 1901, when Ringnes brewery took the building
- Called West Café og Restaurant until 1940
- 207 works by more than seventy artists on the walls
Visiting
Lorry is in Oslo, Norway, at Parkveien 12, 0350 Oslo. We do not list opening times, because they change; the pub’s own site is the place to check before you set out.
Sources
Know something we don’t?Suggest a correctionLast checked Oct 2026
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