I was recently invited by George Bushell from the Shakespeare to join him and his colleague Charlie Slack at Loxley Brewery for a brewday. As part of Sheffield Beer Week, the Shakespeare is currently working with several Sheffield breweries and local businesses to produce a range of collaboration beers which will be available during Beer Week – watch the Shakespeare’s socials for details, but at time of writing these were planned to include:
Loxley – Bitter
Abbeydale – El Dorado Deception
Little Critters with Nam Song (Vietnamese restaurant in Broomhill) – Vietnamese coffee stout
Little Mesters/Emmanuales – NZ Rye Pale
Duality Brew Co with Freak St (Nepalese cafe in Walkley) – Juicy IPA
Triple Point – Miso Caramel Mild (and some special pins)
Not all are yet brewed and some may change! A launch is planned for Monday 9 March.
Loxley Brewery was started in 2018 by David Woodhead in a disused garage beneath the Wisewood Inn in Loxley. David, a friend of Wisewood’s owner Stephen Wesley, home brewed before taking on the new role and now mostly supplies beer to Wisewood, Raven (Walkley) and No3 (Sharrow) as well as producing bottle-conditioned real ale on premises. With his assistant Christian, David brews about 3 times a fortnight on the 5BBL custom-built kit.
George, Charlie and I all arrived when the mash was already on, and got to have a good chat with David and Christian about the brewery, and David’s brewing history and prior life in the steel industry. We did a lot of standing around with further talk during the sparge phase – in advance of the day the major elements I knew of for the brewing process were the amounts of waiting involved, with intermittent bursts of cleaning – all of which proved true.
We took turns to ceremoniously shovel bins of spent grain from the tun, which all goes to a good home as animal feed. We also weighed up the hops for the boil, probably our only other contribution for the day! I found it to be a very interesting day and having only had a basic understanding of the steps involved, it was a good learning experience for all the hard work that goes into every pint we sit down with.
At this point the Wisewood Inn had opened for the day and we celebrated what should be an excellent bitter with a pint and a chip butty!
A huge thanks to everyone at Loxley, the Wisewood Inn and the Shakespeare – keep an eye on their social media for upcoming events and where to drink the beer when it’s out.
A new initiative has been launched by the Welcome to Sheffield website, aimed at promoting the city’s various beer festivals around the UK. The Sheffield Inspires section of the website lists seven key themes that are being promoted, one of which is The Craft of Beer.
The pages cover a wealth of information about the local beer scene, breweries, pubs and festivals, and provides a great resource for potential visitors.
In 2013, Jules Gray opened ‘a labour of beery love’: one of the first ‘drink in’ beer shops in the UK, the multiple award-winning Hop Hideout. Originally based in a former Yorkshire Penny Bank on Abbeydale Road, 2019 saw a move to the Kommune food hall in the centre of Sheffield.
Hop Hideout’s taps when they were in the Kommune food hall
Five years later, after the rigours of Covid, brought relocation to the Grade II listed, Leah’s Yard (S1 4HP) when, it reopened after restoration. This early 19th century site was originally built as small workshops for the manufacture of hand tools.
Hop Hideout in Leah’s Yard
Brought up in County Durham, her journey to Sheffield included a bar-job in a local WMC, study at Sheffield Hallam University, time in both Birmingham and Manchester and after several other positions, working in technical support for a multi-national brewing company in Burton on Trent. After seven years, it was time to move on. A seminal conversation with Zak Avery, the founder of Beer Paradise and co-founder of Beer-Ritz (Leeds), led to an interesting question: ‘Why don’t you set up your own beer shop?’ The rest is history.
Jules also runs the annual Sheffield Beer Week (SBW, https://sheffieldbeerweek.co.uk/). This takes place during the second week in March, coinciding with International Women’s Day (8th). Organised by Jules and her colleague, Claire Tollick, the first incarnation in 2015, saw about ten venues, with events spread over the week: recent years have had over forty venues. SBW and Norwich City of Beer are the only two UK-based city-wide beer events which have been in place for over a decade.
She recalls the first year: ‘SBW was inspired by the early days of my newly launched beer business. I was getting excited by the independent beer sector. I noticed that there were lots of beer weeks in America, and also Norwich City of Ale was happening in the UK. It was joined up with the frustration of hearing a lot of people talk about near-by cities like Manchester or Leeds and not mentioning Sheffield. And living in the city and seeing it, a tangible beer history, culture, brewers … I was getting quite frustrated as to why people were not talking about Sheffield. And I thought wouldn’t it be great to shout more about the beer scene in the city that I had made my home. And I spoke to a friend who really supported the idea and about two months before the date we got the ball rolling.’
‘After the first-year people saw the economic benefits: increased footfall, a heightening awareness and celebrating venues, the breweries, and the culture, but also attracting people from outside the region to visit Sheffield to discover wonderful things that we sometimes take for granted. I just love it. I want people to get that joy and excitement across to other people. On the flip side you do need a bit of a cheerleader to raise awareness and join up the dots of the community. There is a tipping-point. You need more than one, it becomes a trail. You bounce off each other.’
The main aim of this independent beer focused event is to bring additional footfall. The first three years coincided with Sheffield hosting the annual SIBA Conference, this providing a ready source of beer-interested visitors. When the SIBA conference moved to Liverpool, Jules was both humbled, and reassured, by the local demand for SBW to continue. It was something people thought was really valuable.
She recalls: ‘At the time it felt like the local council weren’t valuing the culture, community and historic value of the brewing and beer sector, the businesses which were driving visitor footfall. This has definitely changed: momentum has grown. That momentum has led the Sheffield Inspires campaign to include ‘the Craft of Brewing’ as one of their five main strands. It’s been a gradual positive relationship development.’
In 2020, SBW was the last large beer event in the UK before lockdown. Personally, I recall leading a Pub Heritage Walk on Friday 13th March. This was my last ‘big go-out’ for a considerable period … 16th March saw official advice to avoid all non-essential contact, lockdown following on the 23rd. The following year saw a virtual event.
Dave Pickersgill at the last pre-Covid SBW heritage walk
2026 brings the 12th incarnation: a week-long festival (6-15 March) celebrating the region’s brewing landscape. Collaboration is key with Sheffield’s bars, pubs and restaurants joining forces with both local organisations and local, national, and international breweries to host a large variety of events. I led my first SBW pub heritage walk from Fagan’s in 2017: this year, in collaboration with local historian, John Stocks, a talk, and a walk, will concentrate on Little Chicago.
Indie Beer Feast
SBW commences with Indie Beer Feast, a two-day celebration of independent craft beer: brewery bars, street food, low intervention wines, and fine cider.
Until 2020, this took place at Abbeydale Picture House. After a break due to Covid, 2022 saw a move to the 1930s industrial space of Trafalgar Warehouse.
Pete Brown, Author of “Tasting Notes”
As usual, 2026 will see several collaborative brews, all focused on the theme of Sheffield synth city: a tribute to the pioneering electronic music which the city has produced. For example, St.Mars of the Desert are hosting an, as yet, unannounced local band while relatively new breweries Duality and Ticking Clock are working together. Designed by Lewis Ryan, the visual map for the event is taking inspiration from the 1981 Human League album, Dare, while the botanical inspired artwork has been designed by local illustrator, Sanpo. There is also an input from well-known beer writer, Pete Brown, who at an event hosted by Hop Hideout, will be interviewed by music and culture writer Daniel Dylan Wray about matching beer and music.
As Jules put it: ‘‘Sheffield Synth City’ allows us to blend the creativity of our independent breweries with the ground-breaking spirit of our electronic music pioneers. It’s powerful to showcase how innovation thrives across all creative industries in the Steel City.”
Reflecting back on SBW, she comments: ‘it’s an umbrella event‘…it’s something customers love, it really chimes with them, it creates a good buzz and excitement. There are lots of positives: learning and knowledge transfer. From both a trade and customer perspective, customers love it.’
‘Sheffield has so many things, the Home of Football, electronic music legacy, beer, and brewing. I think people don’t mention Sheffield, City of Stainless Steel and what drives the brewing industry. We don’t mention the impact we’ve had in the sector. To me, that’s a massive light-bulb revelation.’
The invention of stainless steel is often credited to Sheffield native, Harry Brearley, who in 1913, discovered that adding chromium to molten iron created a rust-resistant alloy. Stainless Steel is extensively used worldwide as a key part of the brewing process, from coppers to fermenting vessels to casks … it is an often un-noticed, but crucial part of the contribution of Sheffield to the worldwide beer industry: Sheffield could be seen as the ‘Home of Modern Beer.’
Beer tourism is a crucial cog in Sheffield; the footfall and financial benefit is a win-win for the local hospitality and brewing industries. Sheffield Beer Week is a crucial part of this jigsaw. We hope you all have an enjoyable time when you visit the best beer city in the world.
Jules Gray in Hop HideoutOutside Hop Hideout in Leah’s YardMerch at Hop HideoutLittle Chicago talk at the Crow Inn
Here is a summary of events that were confirmed at the time of writing to offer an idea of what to expect – many more will be added after we’ve gone to press, check their website for the latest information – sheffieldbeerweek.co.uk.
If you fancy nipping between a number of venues by bus or tram then an all day travel pass from Travelmaster such as the Citywide ticket may prove good value. Public transport information can be found online at travelsouthyorkshire.com.
13 March, Pangolin: Duration Brewing Great Farmhouse Expo – from 1pm they will have 7 lines of beer from this range including juicy pales on cask, a grisette and even a barrel aged lager!
13 March: Guided Pub Heritage Walk – Little Chicago, 4pm. Advance tickets required.
13 March, University Arms: Pub Heritage Talk – Little Chicago, 7:45pm. Advance tickets required.
The folks from Sheffield Beer Week joined Abbeydale Brewery’s team for a special brewday to produce a collaboration beer that will be available in various participating venues during beer week.
Sheffield’s breweries will be celebrating the city’s sonic and synth musical heritage in 2026 under the banner of ‘Sheffield Synth City’ for Sheffield Beer Week. Running from Monday March 9th to Sunday March 15th, 2026. The week-long celebration of the city’s independent beer scene will pay homage to Sheffield’s legendary electronic music heritage and continuing legacy, home to pioneers of synth-pop, electronic, and bleep-and-bass, including The Human League, Heaven 17, Cabaret Voltaire, Clock DVA, Warp Records and everything in-between. Breweries involved so far include Abbeydale, Tapped Brew Co, Triple Point, Kelham Island, Bradfield, Little Mesters, Emmanuales, Ticking Clock, Thornbridge, Duality, True North, Little Critters and Saint Mars of the Desert. These unique brews will be inspired by classic electronic music genres, iconic Sheffield bands, or even the flavour profiles of their favourite analogue synths. This theme will create an innovative mash-up of two of Sheffield’s celebrated cultural exports—its renowned brewing industry and its influential music scene.
“Sheffield is a city of steel, beer, and synthesisers. ‘Sheffield Synth City’ allows us to blend the creativity of our independent breweries with the ground-breaking spirit of our electronic music pioneers,” says Jules Gray, Founder of Sheffield Beer Week and Hop Hideout. “It’s powerful to showcase how innovation thrives across all creative industries in the Steel City.”
During the rest of the week expect ‘Sheffield Synth City’ beer collaborations pouring around the city, tap takeovers from local to global independent breweries, meet the brewers, brewery tours, beer walking tours, beer and food pairings, beer and music pairings and more. This multi-venue event will be celebrated throughout Sheffield’s hospitality venues – from brewery taprooms, pubs, micropubs, bars and beer shops.
South Yorkshire artist Lewis Ryan is working on a visual map project alongside. Sheffield’s Abbeydale Brewery celebrate a big milestone reaching 30 years of brewing in 2026! Then International Women’s Collaboration Brew Day (@IWCBD /unitebrew.org) on International Women’s Day – 8th March falls in the week once again, so look out for additional events, including a Thornbridge beer launch at their venues such as Hallamshire House, The Stag’s Head and The Greystones pubs. Local historian Dave Pickersgill, editor of CAMRA’s ‘Sheffield’s Real Heritage Pubs’ will hold his much-loved beer and history walks. While Strange Britain’s Adrian Finney will host his popular haunted pub walking tour. Tartarus Beers will be helping The Wonky Labrador with their 3rdbirthday merrymaking. Woodland Brewing will be hosting a meet the brewer at The Bear. While beer broadcaster Pete Brown will be interviewed by music and culture writer Daniel Dylan Wray focusing on his latest groove of beer and music pairing at Hop Hideout beer shop.
Plus a number of international Belgian breweries will be popping up around the city such as Brewery Vanhonsebrouck (Kasteel beers) at The Crow and Timmermans at Hop Hideout. Ceramic studio Earth Paper Fibre will be hosting a beer tankard making workshop in Leah’s Yard. There are plenty more events to be announced, this is just a musical snippet. Check the Sheffield Beer Week website to discover venues and event listings throughout February, as they begin to be advertised.
On the weekend of 6 to 7thMarch, to kick-off the week, Sheffield’s craft beer festival, Indie Beer Feast launches. A celebration of great independent craft beer with brewery bars, street food, rum, fine wines, and cider. The beer festival champions and supports The Everyone Welcome initiative. British Guild of Beer Writers’ members and leading UK award-winning beer writers Pete Brown, Rachel Auty (Women on Tap) and Adrian Tierney-Jones will be heading up to host pop-up tastings and to judge the Indie Beer Feast ‘Beer of the Festival’. Alongside further pop-up tastings from breweries pouring at the festival and Sheffield, via Brazil, based journalist and broadcaster Livia Barreira of ‘Living in Sheffield’. This year’s botanical inspired artwork has been designed by Sheffield based illustrator Sanpo. Breweries pouring and announced so far include Sheffield’s Abbeydale, Derbyshire’s Thornbridge and Ashover Brew Co, Manchester’s Cloudwater and Courier Brewing, Nottinghamshire’s Liquid Light and Ticking Clock, Somerset’s Yonder, Liverpool’s Neptune, Leeds’ Tartarus, Reading’s Siren, and Birmingham’s Attic. Alongside additional bars from Hop Hideout beer shop and specialist rum aficionado RumKeg876.
Get ready to tune in and follow the beat: Stay up-to-date with all announcements by following @SheffBeerWeek on social media (Facebook / Instagram) and checking the official website.
Thanks again to all who made donations to Sheffield Children’s Hospital Charity at SCBF49. Over the last few weeks, many of you will have noticed references to Sheffield CAMRA on their snowflakes.
Illustrated are: Sheffield City Hall, the Childrens’ Hospital, the Ryegate Centre and our Chair, Paul Manning and grandson, Marcus, with Theo the charity bear at the Becton snowflake unveiling.
An event at the Portland Works in early October saw the formal launch of a new report by Prof. Phil Withington and Dr. Nicholas Groat (University of Sheffield) which explores the place of ‘craft’ alcohol in the city’s past, present, and future. The research was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.
Sheffield was chosen as previous reports have established the city as the ‘UK capital of beer.’ A high density of independent breweries is mirrored by a large proportion of independent pubs, bars, and specialist off-licences.
An immediate key finding: one which was not expected at the project inception is that the word ‘craft’ has been devalued. It is now a problematic term, one which has been taken by the multi-nationals.
‘Independent’ is more appropriate. This captures a commitment to small-scale, autonomous artisanship, passion, skill & community (see for example, the SIBA ‘Indie Beer’ campaign). ‘Independent’ is part of the Sheffield heritage.
Since 2021, Sheffield and District CAMRA publications have defined ‘craft beer’ as ‘a meaningless phrase, often used in marketing or an enigma: ‘undefinable and misunderstood.’’ It seems that the University researchers agree with this definition.
The study also shows how the independent sector’s geography reflects Sheffield’s long history as a ‘city of neighbourhoods’ and how the values and working practices of the sector can contribute to a sustainable and vibrant future. The ‘Independent’ sector forms a significant proportion of sites dedicated to producing, retailing & consuming alcohol. The survey found that 42% of their sample (464) were independent. Sheffield has a high percentage of such ownership, a direct reflection of the city’s unique history of distinct, interconnected neighbourhoods.
Other findings include a local emphasis on drink ‘better’ not ‘more.’ In addition, quality of ingredients, culture of drinking environments and responsible & considerate habits are all important.
The lack of means for the independent sector was to organise was also noted. There is no city-wide forum, a need for liaising with city authorities and a lack of marketing & other strategies to enhance the sector.
Recommendations include:
Use ‘independence’ not ‘craft’
Form a Sheffield Indy Drinks Hub as the collective voice of the sector
Explore how other places with concentrations of independent producers organise and market themselves
A number of our beer festival volunteers had a get-together recently to try their hand at dutch shuffleboard, or Sjoelen to give it it’s correct name.
The game involves sliding wooden discs along the board to try and get them into the numbered compartments. Not as easy as you might think as all the failed attempts start to build up!
In the upstairs room at the Harlequin on Nursery Street, over 20 of us tried our hand in a highest score competition and a quickfire play-off version. All over a few of the Harlequin’s excellent beers of course.
The pub also kindly donated £25 worth of vouchers for our two winners.
Lee Vallett won the high score competition, and Jamie Smith won the play-off.
It was a great success, and a repeat afternoon is planned for sometime in the spring.
Malc Anderson at the board watched by Ally Smith, Ian & Anne Ashforth and Lee VallettPlay-off finalists Jamie Smith & Jess Cawley Jamie in the process of winning the final
