Qualla: Museum of Cider https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:15 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/q/0/museum-of-cider-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Museum of Cider https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider Museum of Cider: Introduction https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider/ Photo credit Rob Purvis, CC BY-SA 2.0. Henry Percival Bulmer was twenty years old in 1887 when he made his first batch of cider. His father was the rector of Credenhill, just outside Hereford, and the family had no obvious reason to go into the apple business. But Herefordshire was thick with orchards and Henry had ideas. A year later he and his brother Fred bought a plot of land on the edge of Hereford and built a shack. They dug cellars beneath it in 1889. By the 1920s the shack had a grand frontage and the Bulmer name was on bottles across England. The Museum of Cider now lives in the original factory at Pomona Place, surrounded by the cellars Henry dug.

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Image: Rob Purvis | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Mon, 25 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/q/0/museum-of-cider-wp/gcq0-museum-of-cider-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Museum of Cider: From Shack to Empire https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider/ Photo credit Philip Halling, CC BY-SA 2.0. The Bulmer story is one of those Victorian arcs that sounds invented. Henry started making cider in 1887. By the early 20th century he had transformed cider from a rural cottage beverage into an industrial product sold nationally. The company introduced champagne-style cider, fer...

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Image: Philip Halling | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Mon, 25 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/q/0/museum-of-cider-wp/gcq0-museum-of-cider-from-shack-to-empire.mp3 0:06 2 full Museum of Cider: The Trust That Saved the Story https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider/ Photo credit Philip Halling, CC BY-SA 2.0. By the 1970s, traditional cider-making was disappearing fast - small farm presses replaced by industrial vats, oral knowledge dying with the makers. Bertram Bulmer, Norman Weston, and the director of Long Ashton Research Station John Hudson saw what was happening and set up a tru...

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Image: Philip Halling | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Mon, 25 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/q/0/museum-of-cider-wp/gcq0-museum-of-cider-the-trust-that-saved-the-story.mp3 0:06 3 full Museum of Cider: What the Cellars Hold https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider/ Photo credit Philip Halling, CC BY-SA 2.0. The original cellars from 1889 run beneath the museum, lined with the equipment that turned Herefordshire apples into bottled cider for the first half of the 20th century. A cooper's workshop, a vat house, a bottling line. A 300-year-old French beam press, massive and beam-balanc...

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Image: Philip Halling | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Mon, 25 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/q/0/museum-of-cider-wp/gcq0-museum-of-cider-what-the-cellars-hold.mp3 0:06 4 full Museum of Cider: The Brandy Licence https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider/ Photo credit Philip Halling, CC BY-SA 2.0. In one curious chapter, the Museum of Cider became the first place in Britain in 200 years to be granted a licence by HMRC to distil cider into brandy. The distinctive spirit - similar to French Calvados, which is made the same way in Normandy - had not been produced commercially...

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Image: Philip Halling | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Mon, 25 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/q/0/museum-of-cider-wp/gcq0-museum-of-cider-the-brandy-licence.mp3 0:06 5 full Museum of Cider: The Competition and the Pensioners https://qualla.com/museum-of-cider/ Photo credit Philip Halling, CC BY-SA 2.0. The museum runs an annual programme of events that includes art exhibitions, talks, and the International Cider and Perry Competition - one of the most respected blind judgings in the cider world. The competition has run since the early 1980s. In 2018 there were 210 entries. The ...

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Image: Philip Halling | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Mon, 25 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/q/0/museum-of-cider-wp/gcq0-museum-of-cider-the-competition-and-the-pensioners.mp3 0:06 6 full