Will Hawkes
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willhawkes.bsky.social
Will Hawkes
@willhawkes.bsky.social
Writes about food, beer, travel. Author of Telegraph’s 500 Best Pubs in England & @LondonBeerCity, monthly missive on pubs & beer. Fortnum and Mason Drink Writer of the Year 2021 & 2023
Reposted by Will Hawkes
It just got left on the wrong side of the border after all that unpleasantness in the early 1920s...
November 14, 2025 at 5:08 PM
Have I really been so carelessly provocative? 😲 There's only one way to find out. Sign up here: www.willhawkes.net/london-beer-...
November 14, 2025 at 4:22 PM
It's the worst beer vessel. Like drinking out of a vase
One more! @willhawkes.bsky.social offers this aside: “Having ordered…the only cask beer available, it is served in a dimpled handled jug - the worst drinking vessel on earth. The jug of shame!”

1, counterpoint, it’s the *best* vessel, and 2, this is the hottest hip mug in the U.S. culture is weird!
There is, incredibly, a new @londonbeercity.bsky.social tomorrow. It features Guinness' belated arrival in Covent Garden, London pubs owned by London breweries, the new venue for LCBF, The Lady magazine and lots more. Sign up here: www.willhawkes.net/london-beer-...
November 14, 2025 at 4:13 PM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
There is, incredibly, a new @londonbeercity.bsky.social tomorrow. It features Guinness' belated arrival in Covent Garden, London pubs owned by London breweries, the new venue for LCBF, The Lady magazine and lots more. Sign up here: www.willhawkes.net/london-beer-...
November 13, 2025 at 2:25 PM
This is being sent out right now! Thrilling when you think about it
There is, incredibly, a new @londonbeercity.bsky.social tomorrow. It features Guinness' belated arrival in Covent Garden, London pubs owned by London breweries, the new venue for LCBF, The Lady magazine and lots more. Sign up here: www.willhawkes.net/london-beer-...
November 14, 2025 at 8:03 AM
There is, incredibly, a new @londonbeercity.bsky.social tomorrow. It features Guinness' belated arrival in Covent Garden, London pubs owned by London breweries, the new venue for LCBF, The Lady magazine and lots more. Sign up here: www.willhawkes.net/london-beer-...
November 13, 2025 at 2:25 PM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
News!

We have plans for a print Pellicle in 2026 but we can only do that with your help. Become a Patreon subscriber now and support our b̶i̶d̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶l̶d̶ ̶d̶o̶m̶i̶n̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ writers, artists and editors, and keep Pellicle free to read for all 🫶🏻

www.pelliclemag.com/home/2025/11...
An Important Update About Our Subscription Fees (And How To Support Pellicle) — Pellicle
When Jonny and I started working on Pellicle in earnest at the very start of 2019, we spent a long afternoon discussing how we hoped to fund it. From day one, we were dedicated to paying every contrib...
www.pelliclemag.com
November 10, 2025 at 9:08 AM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
thank you to everyone who has pre ordered a zine! we are halfway to our pre order target already which is HUGE. you can get a cap now also! they’re gorgeous imo. the whole project is fun and beautiful and silly and i’m so proud of what we’ve created!

Get a copy here ⬇️

www.burumcollective.com/jlp
November 7, 2025 at 4:24 PM
Pleased to see one of those out in the wild - or, to give it its proper name, East London (lol rofl). At the marvellous Pembury Tavern.
November 7, 2025 at 3:39 PM
Saw my first Christmas Tree o’ the season this evening. 6 November! Gets earlier every year
November 6, 2025 at 8:24 PM
This is niche, but might be useful for some. According to my personal HMRC-employed tax advisor (wife), the rules relating to freelance journalists going on paid press trips/being sent free samples, etc, has not changed. The new guidance is more for influencers who, for e.g., are receiving ... 1/2
November 6, 2025 at 4:04 PM
Is it me or is this BBC bar chart awful? Why does it start from 0 years old?! People don't play Test cricket at the age of 0, not even Don Bradman. Goodness
November 5, 2025 at 4:27 PM
Wow, quite rude of @bathedailey.bsky.social to do this portrait of me without asking permission - but it does give me an opportunity to promote this opinion-packed pub package featuring my views on cocktails (no) & taking glasses back ➡️ the bar (yes)
Taking empties back to the bar for @pelliclemag.com's latest multi-contributor Essential guide to pub etiquette: www.pelliclemag.com/home/2025/10...
November 5, 2025 at 12:28 PM
Wetherspoons' sales currently up 3.7 percent on last financial year, according to Propel: "Bar sales increased by 5.7%, food by 0.9% and slot/fruit machines by 8.9%, while hotel room sales decreased by 6.3%. Total sales have grown by 4.2% in the year to date"
November 5, 2025 at 9:14 AM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
The Pellicle Essential Guide to Pub Ettiquette!

Already noted as curmudgeonly by @boakandbailey.bsky.social, we prefer "righteously bothered."

Table rezzies, bogey-filled tissues in empty glasses, rounds and more, all documented for posterity.

www.pelliclemag.com/home/2025/10...
The Essential Guide to Pub Etiquette — Pellicle
It was the writer and politician Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953) who famously said, “ Change your hearts or you will lose your inns and you will deserve to have lost them. But when you have lost your inns ...
www.pelliclemag.com
November 5, 2025 at 8:18 AM
I’ve now tried the new Boddington’s. It’s fine. Presumably this is not the same beer elderly Mancunians have spent decades tearfully eulogising?
November 2, 2025 at 5:10 PM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
My home town tonight. Rewind to about -2.28 for the start of the good shit.

www.youtube.com/live/GnjkM3N...
Bridgwater Guy Fawkes Carnival 2025
YouTube video by BGFCarnival
www.youtube.com
November 1, 2025 at 10:17 PM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
Anyway next weeks Pellicle piece is a fucking banger. Maybe our bangingest banger yet? Nine people worked on it, all got paid. We’re a micro entity with a turnover of 50k a year, if we can manage it everyone else sure as hell can
October 31, 2025 at 12:26 PM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
Spooooky Halloween special for @pelliclemag.com this month. It’s Halloween somewhere 💁‍♀️

www.pelliclemag.com/home/2025/10...
October 31, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
I wrote something on my phone while sitting on my train to Lincoln, and liked it, so I decided to publish it. A little something about grief, and travel, and Jaipur in the Sheffield Tap.

www.totalales.co.uk/blog/2025/10...
October 31, 2025 at 2:14 PM
Guinness’s new brewery/venue in London finally has an opening date: 11th December. As revealed in @londonbeercity.bsky.social a year ago (!), head brewer will be Hollie Stephenson: imbibemagazine.com/hollie-steph...
2019 Beer Person of the Year: Hollie Stephenson
Hollie Stephenson, our 2019 Beer Person of the Year, is taking something old and making it freshly brewed at Baltimore’s experimental Open Gate Brewery & Barrel House, Guinness’ first U.S. brewery sin...
imbibemagazine.com
October 29, 2025 at 8:29 AM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
Good morning from my inbox where I have 14 (fourteen) pitches I would like to commission, but I don't have the budget to fund any of them. I keep banging on about this, but @pelliclemag.com needs more subscribers if it is to continue. Please spread the word.

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October 27, 2025 at 10:44 AM
I walked past The Crown in Brum the other day. It now has pictures of Black Sabbath - a band which, to all intents and purposes, was born at the pub - on the windows. Not sure if this is a good or bad sign
October 24, 2025 at 10:05 AM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
Pubs outperforming the rest of the on-trade, according to CGA.
October 24, 2025 at 9:00 AM
Reposted by Will Hawkes
What happens when you say, “Is there anything I can do?” and they say, “Yes, actually.” 😱

The unfortunate merging of child care, history and a hangover. @deserterblog.bsky.social
Pub Culture
Pubs are living history. Let's get learning
open.substack.com
October 21, 2025 at 7:23 AM