Jeremy Clarkson buys Cotswolds pub at former dogging hotspot

The former Top Gear star has reportedly paid “less than £1 million” for The Windmill which is nestled in five acres of countryside near Burford.

Formerly a wedding and banqueting venue set, the pub is expected to be majorly renovated and garner a new name.

Speaking to The Times, Mr Clarkson explained the reasoning behind adding the pub to his growing portfolio.

The pub which Jeremy Clarkson has purchased. (Image: Google Maps)

“I decided last year that I’d like to buy a pub. So I called everyone I know who has one and they all said the same thing: the pub business is dying,” he said.

“They’re closing at the rate of more than a thousand a year. You would have to be mad to buy one. Insane.

“So I’ve bought a pub. It turns out that when you walk into a pub and ask if you can buy it, the owner will react in one of two ways.

“Either he will fall to his knees and sob with gratitude.

"Or he will fall to his knees and cling tightly to your legs while making a high-pitched keening noise, and sob with gratitude.”

The pub has an interesting history with the 64-year-old revealing that it is close to a former hotspot for dogging.“I did a deal and then discovered that there was a famous dogging site in the area.

“Photographs from inside the nearby lavatories showed holes in the cubicle walls, strong pornography on the floor and evidence of enthusiastic consumption of the drugs made at the first pub I’d considered.

“So I went to see West Oxfordshire district council, expecting no help at all, and, blow me down, it was very happy to close the dogging site.

“So I was in business. My dream would become a reality.”

Mr Clarkson also owns Diddly Squat Farm in Chadlington but admitted that purchasing a pub too close to home was not an option.

He added: “Owning a pub these days is even more daft than owning a farm. What’s next? You buying a cinema?

Jeremy Clarkson at his farm in Oxfordshire. (Image: PA / Prime Video)

“But there’s something inside a man that causes him to think, when he has the means, it’d be nice to buy the village boozer.

“Obviously, I couldn’t buy my village boozer. The locals would set fire to me if I did that. But the idea wouldn’t go away.”

Mr Clarkson will introduce some interesting house rules at the pub with produce reared on his own farm and his own Hawkstone lager on offer.

“Everything served at the new pub will be grown in the UK to support local farmers, which means coffee and Coca-Cola will be off the menu,” he said.

“Farmers will be entitled to a free pint. Clarkson will sell his own Hawkstone lager as well as produce reared on Diddly Squat Farm.”

Jeremy Clarkson with a pint of Hawkstone. (Image: Hawkstone)

The pub is not expected to open until later this year with much work to be done at the site according to the Grand Tour host.

“There is some work to be done on the pub itself as the cellar is too small, the gable end is falling down, the outside decking area is dangerous, the water is unfit for human consumption, the loft is full of dead rats and the lavatories are illegal,” he said.

“And I can’t start work on any of these things now because when I bought the pub, I inherited a long-standing commitment to a young couple who, in a couple of weeks’ time, are having their wedding reception there.

“It’s entirely possible that I won’t get the place mended and open until the icy hand of winter has descended.”

Jeremy Clarkson owns Diddly Squat Farm. (Image: Press Associaton)