368 Brighton Road
Shoreham-by-Sea
BN43 6RE
01273 441297
The Duke of Wellington in Shoreham was rebuilt for the Kemp Town Brewery in 1928 in the Arts & Crafts style by architect John Leopold Denham (photo 1).
It’s now run by real ale hero Rob Jones who kicked off his beer and brewing career back in the 1980s when he set up the Pitfield Brewery in London’s Hoxton. Before long their Dark Star beer won Camra’s Champion Beer of Britain award. In 1994 Rob moved to the Evening Star in Brighton where he set up the Dark Star Brewery, creating Hophead, a pioneer UK hoppy ale. The brewery grew quickly, moving sites and buying its own pubs. One of them was the Duke of Wellington and in 2013 Rob bought the pub from them and set up on his own.
It continues to sell Dark Star beers and other local craft and cask beers from breweries like Goldmark and Gun. The pub has been Brighton & Southdown Camra Pub of the Year. There are plans to set up a brewery behind the pub and maybe even a distillery.
Live music is the other big thing here and bands and artists of many genres perform at weekends.
The carvings above the front windows show the dolphin logo of the Kemp Town Brewery and a sign for ‘Private Bar’, showing that this was once one of two front doorways (photo 2). An old photo currently on the pub’s Facebook page shows that this was the case. There are several stained glass windows in the Arts & Crafts style, some with the Kemp Town Brewery lettering (photo 3).
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