Jeremy Clarkson has revealed big plans for a historic Cotswolds pub as he sets his sights on a new venture in the wake of the success of ‘Clarkson’s Farm’.
The TV presenter, 64, paid “less than a million pounds” for The Windmill, a stylish and highly regarded establishment near Burford, Oxfordshire, and is now hoping to make his mark with all-British ingredients and bar sets, plus a ban. on loud televisions, fruit vending machines and “confusing” signs in bathrooms.
Years in the making, the former windmill boasts rave reviews and affordable prices, describing itself as a “magical wedding and event venue in Oxfordshire in the heart of the Cotswolds” before announcing it was “under new ownership” on June 4.
Despite initial challenges finding staff “thanks to Brexit” and initial problems with a “loft full of dead rats” and “illegal” bathrooms, Clarkson remains committed to getting the place back up and running quickly, he writes in The Sunday Times who still has a wedding reception to hold “in a couple of weeks.”
However, his friends are less convinced he is up to the challenge, warning the Grand Tour presenter that “the evidence (suggests) it will be a total disaster”.
“As a friend said, ‘Owning a pub is even more absurd than owning a farm these days. What’s next? Buying a movie theater?'” Clarkson wrote in the paper.
The presenter described the challenges of opening a pub and his urgent two-week deadline.
Jeremy Clarkson is part owner of the brewery when Hawkstone beer is brewed
A photo of The Windmill pub in Oxfordshire, recently purchased by Jeremy Clarkson
Even so, the veteran journalist has been improving in recent months as co-owner of the Cotswold brewery that makes his Hawkstone lager, which added to his growing portfolio in 2021 and which takes advantage of the barley grown on his nearby Diddly Squat farm.
The next step, he wrote, was a place where he could sell “everything we produce” on the farm, and his own beer on tap.
“I just needed the pub where all this could happen,” Clarkson wrote in Sunday’s weather“And then, after searching through about 14,000, I found the perfect place.”
He wrote that after purchasing The Windmill he discovered there was “a famous dog-friendly place in the area.”
“I went to West Oxfordshire District Council, not expecting any help, and I was very disappointed, I was very happy to close the dog site. So I went into business.
The former Top Gear presenter said he envisions a “fun” and homely pub with pool, darts and a garden, and somewhere he can go on a Sunday with his granddaughter for ham, eggs and chips.
“British food at a good price with a pint of Hawkstone beer,” he suggested with another gentle sip of his own beer.
Clarkson described the difficulty he had in finding the right pub before deciding on The Windmill.
“Obviously” he couldn’t buy his village pub, because “the locals would burn me down”.
Others arrived with extra baggage; one, he said, had been a county meth lab.
Earlier this month it was reported that villagers had raised concerns that his ‘Venice of the Cotswolds’ could be inundated with visitors if he bought the Grade II listed Coach & Horses Inn in Gloucestershire.
This came after huge queues formed around Clarkson’s Diddly Squat Farm near Chipping Norton, just a 20-minute drive from the pub, after the shop reopened in May.
Avid viewers of the show descended on the former Top Gear star’s farm from the United States, Wales and Germany to celebrate the new launch of the long-awaited third season.
A police van was parked outside the Cotswolds farm earlier this month as some customers were told they would not be able to enter an already overcrowded car park.
The popular farming show sees the former Top Gear and Grand Tour presenter, 64, struggle with the daily challenges of running his 1,000-acre Diddly Squat Farm.
The first and second seasons, which premiered in June 2021 and February 2023 respectively, were an instant hit with audiences across the UK, who were delighted by the array of quirky characters and comical misadventures that appeared throughout the series.
The Windmill is a 400-year-old inn that received rave reviews before it closed.
Villagers feared traffic chaos amid rumours that Jeremy Clarkson (pictured in his farm shop) wanted to buy a historic pub that could attract large crowds.
Huge queues have been pictured outside Jeremy Clarkson’s Diddly Squat farm shop in the Cotswolds following its reopening last month.
The purchase of the Oxfordshire pub links its investments in farming and brewing, with its Hawkstone beer using barley grown at Diddly Squat.
Clarkson partnered with family business Cotswold Brewing Company in 2021 to launch Hawkstone just ten miles from his farm.
Shortly afterwards, the beer brand was named Britain’s fastest-growing private brewery, with sales reaching £7.8m a year in March.
Clarkson shared ambitious plans to continue, aiming for their beer to be available in “200,000 pubs, stretching from the Pacific Northwest to Brisbane.”