The Tollgate Brewery story began in 2005 on the old Woodville site of Brunt, Bucknall & Co, known as the Wooden Box Brewery, the first brewery to be established in the Burton area in 1832. Woodville was formerly Wooden Box, named after the famous toll booth on the road between Ashby de la Zouch and Burton-upon-Trent. The area around the Woodville roundabout (the modern equivalent of the toll booth) is still known as ‘Tollgate’ from which our brewery takes its name.

In 2012 Tollgate Brewery relocated to the National Trust Calke Abbey Estate due to a strong desire from the team at Calke Abbey and the National Trust to bring brewing back to the Estate. In January 2016 a change of ownership brought together the current brewery team. Tollgate Brewery currently occupies one of the National Trust’s farm buildings built in the nineteenth century. We’re a 6-barrel brewery using traditional brewing techniques that would be recognisable to those early brewers in the 1800’s.