Richard BELL is impressed by the majesty of Freud cafe bar in Jericho.

Oxford isn’t the biggest city, and its citizens tend to gravitate to the same places.

Some prefer the Cellar, some the Purple Turtle, some the Bridge, some Park End and some Thirst.

Whichever one of these you visit you’ll notice that the core audience is always the same people.

As a community we seek out those little niches that respond to our preferences, making ourselves comfortable in the darkened corners of the city’s most widely known drinking holes. Of course spending each and every night in a venue, no matter how much we may love its own particular peculiarities, can get a little tedious – at which point we know it’s time to spread our wings, to branch out, to experience something wholly and entirely fresh...

Or in other words what I mean is... it’s fun to get drunk somewhere new.

Freud, in Jericho, is one of those places that has always been there, but I’ve never really given a go.

It’s one of Oxford’s most beautiful bars – a converted 19th-century church that reveres its history, and it is impressive to say the least.

Huge pillars greet you on the way through as though you were popping in for a drink at the Parthenon, before opening out into a cavernous main hall.

When compared to one of my favourite bars, the Purple Turtle, the difference in aesthetic pleasure is simply staggering.

That said, this venue is far from perfect. First off there’s the music. It’s being piped in from somewhere, though for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out where.

Then there’s the bar, serving overpriced bottled beer and over-complicated cocktails.

There’s a reason cocktail bars are small; it’s so the bar can control the amount of people the staff have to serve (ie, it keeps the service snappy and the customers happy).

The entire time I was at Freud, I felt as though I was breaking some rule.

It’s a curious sensation, probably drummed into me by years of Sunday school, but truly I can’t relax in a place like this.

It really is an impressive building, and certainly a beautiful place to go for a drink, but in my heart I know I’d trade in the majesty of Freud for the dirt and grime of the PT any day, but then that’s me.

I know my niche...