Hotel du Vin opens at Brakspear site

The former Brakspear brewery in Henley has re-opened as the seventh Hotel du Vin. The collection of buildings encircling the old brewery yard houses 43 bedrooms.

The architectural integrity of the old brewery has been preserved with one of two private dining rooms and a billiard room being carved out of the old fermentation and old mash house, respectively.

The classical Georgian facade of the old Brakspear's brewery on New Street has been retained as have many of its internal features.

The old brewing copper has been converted into one of the hotel's wet rooms.

Brakspear chief executive Don Bridgman, who attended the opening, said: "It's a stunning conversion of the brewery."

Richard Reed, a journalist on the Henley Standard, said: "It's rather weird place. There's nowhere on the outside that looks like a hotel. But, then again, I never thought it looked like a brewery either."

Hotel du Vin, which bought the freehold of the site for £3.4m, occupies around half of the total brewery area with the remainder set to be converted into apartments.