no. 021 | Duration
Founded in 2019, Duration Brewing is a farmhouse brewery in Norfolk making beautifully balanced beers. Based in Grade II-listed historic ruins, the 4 person team work with local ingredients & small producers to showcase the region’s agricultural heritage.
Another month marks another brand new brewery on our fair isle. Duration was founded in 2019, but the work of getting it to a point of readiness began a year and a half earlier, as founders Bates and Miranda set about renovating the historic, Grade II-listed stone barn in which the brewery now operates from.
Head Brewer Bates cut his teeth at Bermondsey’s Brew By Numbers alongside several US-based breweries, but he never felt the beers he was drinking quite represented his own tastes. Wanting to focus on traditional styles and create a range of beers that speak of the place they were made, he and Miranda set-up Duration.
Describing themselves as a farmhouse brewery, they call Norfolk home which makes a lot of sense when you consider their approach. It’s a region that really values local produce, and Bates and Miranda take full advantage of this by working with local ingredients and small producers, adding everything from local oysters to grape pomace to recent brews.
“We like to make beers that belong”, says Miranda, “good beer, made with good people in a way that respects where we are. You can do so much with the four base ingredients in beer. It all starts with the right water profile, a good grist bill and the perfect selection of yeast and hops. We work with what is in season and locally available, be that local botanicals like fireweed and blackberries to local additions like honey”.
There’s an endearing and refreshing honesty to Duration’s beers and approach. “We don’t throw lots of ‘glitter’ into our beers. We prefer to do more with less, and so you won’t find lots of fruit puree or lactose in them”. That honesty seamlessly switches to forthrightness when we ask about some of the bigger challenges they’ve faced since opening:
“COVID, Brexit and the Cost of Living Crisis have all been incredibly tough challenges. Finding a way to build our dream brewhouse was a challenge in itself, the renovation project took 18 months to plan and fundraise for and a further year to execute. We opened and released our first brews right before all the pubs in the country were forced to shut. In someways our timing could not have been worse but, in others, having so many challenges as a new start up business has taught us to be incredibly adaptive and dynamic”.
We’re thankful that Duration has lived up to its name and continues unabated, with plans to extend the taproom and establish an orchard on the same land as their brewery and taproom. We’ve selected a total of five beers – three from their core range and two experimental beers. All are balanced, elegant and beautifully simple and we hope that you enjoy them.
