The Castle, Macclesfield

A multi room cracker of a pub, full of genuine oldness and character. Entering you need to turn immediately to the right into the main serving face of the servery in a tiny snug, although carrying on through a door to the next room on the right will bring you to the other side of the servery where the small white board noted below unsteadily tells the cask choices. The small front snug has four pulls, one apparently unused the others with beers today from Beartown, Wincle and New Bristol, obviously they change constantly, a reasonable keg choice is on two low T-Bars and a hymn board type display in the back served room has a list. They also do cocktails. The back right room was once waiter served judging by the bell pushes, now replaced by big holes in the walls, it has a superb art nouveau fireplace. To the left on coming in through the door is a larger sitting room and up a few steps at the back another sitting area, there’s not much room anywhere to be honest. The toilets lurk under the staircase in the front to rear corridor and the whole area is an impromptu empty cask and keg store. Default glass is bloody jug so ask for straight if you want something less 1960s. Cosmopolitan bunch of punters ranging from oldsters, hipsters and student types.

There’s a compact and unique multi-room layout in the Castle so I wasn’t surprised to read that CAMRA have listed it as a heritage pub. Off the central corridor to the right is the serving counter with a bar that faces towards a snug in the front right. You’ll need to be lucky to get in here, it was full with four people and a couple of dogs during my recent Monday evening visit. All the draught taps and pulls face into this small area, so there’s a little whiteboard with available beers on the back bar that serves a small seating area with a very worn carpet and a fireplace to the rear. Craft keg and Aspall’s Cider were available on the six keg fonts and the three hand pumps were drawing Red Willow Brewery’s Headless Pale, MBH Beer’s Onyx Stout and Storm Brewing’s Ale Force. The Headless had just been changed to Brewsmith Beer’s El Dorado Ultra-Pale as I ordered, so I went for that instead. Halfway through this decent pint I decided to have a roam, first finding an atmospheric seating area with red worn velvety banquettes and an old fireplace in the front left. In here a couple of people were eating which detracted somewhat from the ambience. At the end of the central corridor some steps lead up to an open plan seating area with a wooden floor that is softened by a couple of large rugs. There was some background music playing, I’d say the pub didn’t really need it. This place is worth a look, although it may get a bit uncomfortable at busy times.

This is a cosy, multiple roomed pub with bags of character, handily located close to the station. The entrance porch has a door to the right for a nice little snug bar, or else continues straight on along a corridor which gives access to other rooms. The snug is a pleasant spot with limited seating and access to the main part of the servery where all the handpulls can be found. Dark wood panels, leaded front windows and an extensive pump clip collection around the walls and ceiling, give the room the feel of a traditional alehouse and the bar has a tongue and groove panelled counter with the bar back to one side, allowing you to look through to the second bar in the back room. The corridor passes a small serving hatch with some nice glasswork, opposite which is a room to the left with nice wood panelling and a good amount of bench and chair seating, plus an old fireplace on the end wall. The rear bar is to the right, in a bare boarded room with low wood panelling, a large rug, a big pub sign style mural, a long curved banquette with bell pushes on the board behind, an attractive tiled fireplace and some patterned leaded glasswork with a full height window above that looks back into the corridor. An open window space at the back looks through to a large rear room which has plenty more tables and chairs, another fireplace with an elaborately framed mirror above and a collection of pub games on the rear window sill. At the end of the corridor, there's a high skylight and the wall here is lined with many potted plants. Indie tunes played quite loudly, which seemed at odds with the pub's general character. The bar supports three cask ales ,which were Intrepid B'am, Tattoo Best and Whim Flower Power on this occasion. A very friendly barmaid poured me an excellent pint of the Best, then came over and fixed my wobbly table before offering to light the fire for me - now that is attentive service. All the locals seemed to have a good rapport with the staff too, and I got the impression this was a popular pub, despite the quiet, mid-afternoon turnout. I was really impressed with this place, which I thought had a great interior, some very well-kept ale and top class service. It was the first pub I visited when I got off the train in Macclesfield and I'm not convinced I saw a better one during my two days here. Date of visit - 16th January 2024