I’ve had a quiet year blogging, having produced precisely none until now. This is partly due to having to deal with other things like moving home and renovating and extending the new house. I’ve also spent a bit of time updating and adding to the monster that is the other part of this website, the guide to (currently) 370 pubs across the UK.

I have made time to visit pubs of course, and I’ve chosen five of the best pubs I visited for the first time this year. I’ve done this for the past five years and it’s fair to say that my tastes haven’t changed too much in that time. All of this year’s are ‘proper pubs’ (whatever that means) and four out of the five are ‘heritage pubs’ with a historic interior. That’s no guarantee of a good pub of course but many are and I wonder if its because the groups that run these pubs are as committed to their preservation as they are to running a good pub.

Star Inn, Bath

23 Vineyards, Bath, BA1 5NA

The Star is had been on my to-do list for a long time and on a short visit to Bath a couple of years ago, I wasn’t able to get there. This was a longer trip in a cool early January and I made time for a couple of visits. This is a place where historic pub cliches like “stepping back in time” and “truly unspoilt” are entirely appropriate. The four wood panelled rooms have hardly changed since the pub was revamped in 1928 and include a narrow corridor with a bench (‘Death Row’), the Glass Room with an open fire and a pull-down shove ha-penny board, a public bar and a lounge.

We had a go at the shove ha-penny and despite us being pretty poor it proved to be very addictive. The pub is run by Bath brewery Abbey Ales and sells a selection of their beers. It also famously serves Draught Bass from the cask into a jug and then from the jug into your glass.

Seven Stars, Oldwinsford

Brook Road, Oldswinford, Stourbridge, DY8 1NQ

The Seven Stars is an imposing Edwardian building just next to Stourbridge Junction station and a fifteen minute walk away from the town centre. It’s run by Black Country Ales, a company that is maintaining the values of local breweries like Bathams and Holdens with their traditional boozers. One difference though is the huge range of cask beers in their pubs, and the Seven Stars serves an amazing 13.

It’s a Camra Heritage Pub with lots of Edwardian woodwork, ceramics and decorative glass. Look out for the art nouveau etched and stained glass windows promoting original owners Mitchell & Butlers, and the blue and cream tiling in the entrance corridor. In the large public bar there’s a splendid carved wooden bar back with mirrors and a central clock. Both the main bars were packed on our visit on a cold midweek February early evening. How do Black Country pubs (the area, not the brewery) do it when custom has fallen so much across the rest of the country? Well run proper pubs with reliable beers help, but maybe the secret is the well stocked cabinets of cobs and pies.

Big Six, Halifax

10 Horsfall Street, Savile Park, Halifax HX1 3HG

I live in West Yorkshire and I’ve been to Halifax and its tremendous pub scene several times, but I’d never made it to the Bix Six on the outskirts of town. A bad move because although I’d heard it was worth a visit, it turned out to be a superb pub. It’s location is unusual these days, in the middle of a row of terraced houses with a street front and back. It has a delightful multiple roomed interior dating from a mixture of a 1920s refit and a refurb by Tetley’s in the 1980s.

On my visit it filled up soon after its 5.00pm opening with a good local crowd of mixed ages and a vocal group of regulars in the public bar. There are four cask ales from mainly Yorkshire breweries.

Crown, Beeston

Church Street, Beeston, NG9 1FY

A train to Nottingham in October to meet up with beer drinking pals, a visit to a couple of pubs close to the station and then another train down to Beeston. Two pubs, the Victoria and the Crown were the targets, and both were contenders for this list. I decided to include the Crown, restored by Everards Brewery and now run by Brown Ales, a small local pub company. There’s a great selection of real ales from local and not so local breweries, with Everards Tiger a regular.

The main entrance takes you into a large modern bar but for the best rooms head on round to the other side to the wood panelled middle room, the comfy Snug Bar and the tiny Public Bar with a long bench facing the counter. At the end is an even tinier bar with room for four, maybe five people at a push.

Vine, Tunstall

13 Naylor Street, Pittshill, Stoke-on-Trent, ST6 6LS

The Vine was probably my favourite pub discovery of 2025, reopening in July in the hands of an enthusiastic young couple who have rescued a wonderful and now very rare back street corner pub. It was the last stop on a shortish crawl around the six towns and involved a bus from Hanley and a good walk up to Pittshill on the edge of Tunstall.

There are two small rooms, both packed on our visit, with the lounge taken over by (I think) a birthday party and the rest of us in the tiny public bar. Before long we were supping pints of Sarah Hughes Mild, tucking into heated pies and talking to everyone in the room. My photos, shamefully for a website called Pub Gallery, were hopeless, especially the out of focus outdoor pic, not helped by a few too many beers. And it was far too crowded in the bar to get a good interior photo so I hope you like the heart shaped ceramic plaque on the pub wall.