Pub nominated for award six months after reopening

The manager of a Shropshire pub has said she was left "gobsmacked" when it was nominated for a regional award six months after reopening.

The Castle Inn in Bletchley, near Market Drayton, was closed until local farmer and long-term pub regular Adrian Marsh bought the building last year.

He initially tried to run it himself but realised he was too busy with other commitments, so he enlisted the help of Davina Warmer and her husband, Daniel.

It was closed again for refurbishment before it reopened in August, and it has since been nominated in the best Midlands pub category in the 2025 Countryside Alliance Awards.

Mrs Warmer told BBC Radio Shropshire: "We were gobsmacked. A lot of the contenders have been running for 10, 15 or 20 years, and we're very new to the game after opening six months ago.

"All of the staff have worked so hard since day one to get to where we are now. It's really very difficult to make a good reputation in this industry when you bring something back that's been closed for a long period of time."

The refurbishment involved £45,000 worth of improvements to the interior, including new flooring, repainted walls and new furniture.

"It's a beautiful building, architecturally very nice, and it catches people's eyes as they go past," Mrs Warmer said.

"It obviously needed quite a bit of work to get it up to a nice standard, but we're getting there."

Mr Marsh said he had been going to The Castle Inn for 31 years and had a lot of happy memories.

"It used to be a tremendous drinking hole for people going to the sea," he added.

"It's been a really, really good place, and Davina and Dan are getting it back to being a really good place."

The award winners will be decided by a public vote which is being run on the Countryside Alliance website until 6 April.

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