The Story of Donnington Brewery

The Story of Donnington Brewery

By Tim O'Rourke

(Extracted from BHS Newsletter 111: December 2025)

Donnington brewery with its three linked buildings nestles at the bottom of a tranquil valley in the Cotswolds only accessible by a single-track road. A mill was built in 1291 to supply the Broadway Estate with flour. In the early part of the 16th century a mill race, and waterwheel was added converting it into a "fulling mill" a process for cleansing woven woollen cloth, making tightly finished fabric that is both insulating and water-repellent. The wool probably came from the local breed of sheep affectionately called "Cotswold Lions" said to have been introduced by the Romans for their "Golden Fleece". It was converted back to a corn mill in 1580 for the manor house; all the mechanisms used to grind the corn remain in the building, including two mill stones, gearing, cogs and the external waterwheel. Next to be built was a maltings to supply small scale brewers and the manor house from locally grown malted barley. It continued to supply malt to Donnington brewery until the mid-1960s.

Early in the 17th century the mill became a separate freehold estate and in 1827 was bought by Thomas Arkell, a local farmer. In 1865 his grandson Richard built the brewery which is sandwiched in the gap between the two original buildings. It would have been difficult to enter the market as many a homestead, public house and estate already brewed their own, but perhaps the quality and consistency from a larger brewery was able to persuade the customers to buy from Donnington Brewery instead.

The brewery has remained in the Arkell family ever since. Richard was followed into the business by his sons, but it was Herbert who assumed overall control. He was succeeded by his son Claude who after he returned from the RAF in 1951, ran the brewery until his death in 2007. With no children of his own to follow him, he left the brewery to his cousins Peter and James Arkell, the owners of Arkell's Brewery in Swindon. It is now jointly run by James and his son Jonny who carries out most of the day-to-day operations. The Brewery produces three cask beers: Best Bitter (BB), Special Bitter Ale (SBA) which are based on traditional recipes and local ingredients with a recently introduced lighter crisper Cotswold Gold.

The brewery provides a fascinating window into the history of ale brewing in England and uses most of the original equipment dating back to the beginning of the 20th century including the use of water to power some of the operations.

The brewing process

The hot water tank is fed by well water and is heated by steam to provide all the liquor required for mashing and sparging. The brewery uses British malt from a commercial maltster. Each sack of malt is hoisted from the malt store to the mill room floor using a hoist powered by the waterwheel. The malt is loaded into a malt hopper and passes through a four roller Boby mill installed in 1920 to replace the mill stones and goes into the grist case above the mash tun. The grist is mashed through a Steel's masher driven by the water wheel. Water at strike temperature around 74 degrees C from the hot water tank is combined with the grist in an isothermal mash with a stand at 65 degrees C for 60 minutes to complete conversion before being run off to an underback. The wort from the underback is then pumped to the kettle using pumps powered by the waterwheel. Spent grains are dug out by hand and sent to local farmers.

The copper kettle was originally direct fired using coal and the fire box is still there. Today an internal steam calandria gives a vigorous rolling boil. Only a handful of pellet hops are added to the kettle to control over foaming. The wort is boiled for 60 minutes before being dropped under gravity to the hop back. British cone hops grown in Hereford and Worcestershire are used to line the base of the hop back before the boiled wort is transferred. The wort in the hop back is allowed to stand for 45 minutes to allow the solids to settle and to extract the bitter and aroma compounds from the hops. The clarified hot wort is transferred to an open coolship where it stands for a few minutes before being pumped via a hop filter to a plate heat exchanger and then to a collection vessel. Most of the wort cooling is achieved through the modern plate wort cooler which cools the wort to below 18 degrees C and heats the brewing liquor which is then available for the next brew. The wort is collected in a gauging vessel where yeast is pitched and mixed with the help of an agitator. The yeast comes from Hook Norton Brewery and is used for no more than eight generations.

The following day the fermenting wort is transferred to a fermentation vessel with cold break removal which settles to the bottom of the collection vessel. Fermentation takes place in open vats with vacuum skimming. Yeast collected for re-pitching is stored in a fridge until used. An ambient temperature of around 20 degrees C is maintained in the fermentation room and each fermenter has its own water cooling if required. Primary fermentation is followed by a period of settling before being dropped into a racking back. Most of the beer is racked into firkins or pins to supply a small estate of twenty tenanted pubs spread around the Cotswolds with the occasional free trade customer. Donnington Gold is often featured as a guest beer in the Arkells estate.

Until the 1980s, Donnington brewery bottled its own beer on site but now this is transferred in bulk to Arkells in Swindon which has a state-of-the-art bottling line. Bottled beer is sold at the brewery and there is a regular flow of customers coming to collect beer. The brewery offers tours on a Friday which can be booked on the website at donnington-brewery.com. With 160 years of brewing experience, it is certainly worthy of a visit to see traditional ale practices, enjoy good cask conditioned beers and drink in the beautiful scenery in perhaps the most idyllic brewery in the country.

Tim O'Rourke