Supporting Education

The Brewers' Company is very proud of our connection with the fantastic Aldenham and Dame Alice Owen's Schools, which we support through our charities. Each year, we celebrate these relationships, dating back to the foundation of the schools in 1597 and 1613 respectively, with a reception at Brewers' Hall for students and staff, hosted by the Master and other Liverymen.

This year we were joined by Aldenham Prefect, Richard Platt (pictured above with the Master and his Headmaster), who shares a name with the former Master Brewer who founded his school all those years ago. The Elizabethan Richard Platt grew up in Aldenham and, although he moved to London and became a successful brewer later in life, he never forgot where he came from, founding his school there to ensure "the good nurture and training up of youth, in learning, virtue and good manners".

Just sixteen years later, Dame Alice Owen's School was founded at the behest of the formidable Dame Alice Owen, widow to a brewer, a merchant and a judge, and possessed of a large fortune. In her will, Dame Alice Owen asked her 'beloved and trusty friends' the Brewers' Company to be the Governors, Rulers, Patrons and Maintainers - a duty that we still take very seriously today.

We were delighted to be joined by the students last week in celebration of the past, the present and the future.