News Article Comments : Leaving no Stone unturned

Brewing has returned to Stone. The small Staffordshire market town was once famous as the home of two sizeable breweries, Bents and Joules, both taken over and closed down in the 1960s by Bass Charrington.

But now the new Lymestone Brewery is bringing both pleasure and pride back to the town. The old Joules buildings still stand and are used as shops, offices and a large supermarket. The Bents site, known as the Old Brewery, is now the base for industrial units, including Lymestone, where Ian Bradford and Ron Makins are using water from the original brewery well to fashion their beers.

It was water that determined the course of brewing history in Stone and many other parts of Staffordshire. The hard waters of the Trent Valley, rich in natural salts, enabled breweries — in Burton-on-Trent in particular — to develop pale ales and India Pale Ales in the 19th century. The importance of the local water in Stone can be measured by the fact that, when Joules closed, the water table rose so