Quotations from P G Wodehouse are copyright of, and reprinted by permission of, the Trustees of the Wodehouse Estate © 2012 The P G Wodehouse Society (UK)

Empress of Blandings becomes a Society member!

As reported recently in Wooster Sauce, the in-house magazine for members of our society, a pub called The Empress of Blandings has recently become a member! The pub is owned, appropriately enough, by the family-run brewery Hall and Woodhouse. Hall and Woodhouse are well known for their ales such as Badgers and Tangle Foot.

The Empress of Blandings pub is in Copythorne, Hampshire and was visited by the editor of Wooster Sauce, Elin Murphy, along with Jean Tillson, a Wodehousean from the US. Amongst other things they noticed that the pub sign features a painting of a Berkshire taken from The Pig - Breeding, Rearing and Marketing, by Sanders Spencer, which PG Wodehouse may well have seen on his visits to Hunstanton Hall in Norfolk.

It transpires that the retail director of Hall and Woodhouse, David Hoare, is a PGW fan and thought of renaming the pub to its current name when the company acquired and refurbished it a few years ago. He discovered Wodehouse's connection with Hunstanton Hall and then the Sanders Spencer book, which gave him the illustration for the pub sign.

There is also PGW quotation on the wall outside:

"The Empress of Blandings was as nearly circular as a pig can be without bursting. She resembled a captive balloon with ears and a tail."

If you are in the area and would like to visit this pub, please click here and go to the pub search section.