BRITAIN’s 'most festive pub' has become home to a 26-foot snowman made from 2,500 wine bottles in Somerset.

The Queen Victoria Inn in Priddy has been putting on Christmas lights displays for the past decade - as a way to raise funds for charity.

This year the popular pub features a huge wreath on the side of the building, a Christmas tree and a snowman made from hundreds of empty wine bottles.

The pub is also covered in 55,000 Christmas lights collected over the years and 15km of cabling.

The snowman comprises a huge steel structure supporting 2,500 empty wine bottles collected by the pub and other restaurants in the area.

For the Christmas tree they used 1,100 empty wine bottles to build it.

Landlord Mark Walton, 57, said: "It brings many visitors - it is absolutely mental.

"We are a little pub in the middle of nowhere and it puts us on the map.

"It gets us through the quiet times. It has been in the top 10 Christmas decorations on Microsoft News and things like that and we just laugh at it.

"We just walk past it and think nothing of it and then you see people coming in and they are like 'wow'."

Thousands of lights will be switched on each day from 4pm to 9pm - with the spectacle closing for the season on New Year's Eve.

Mr Walton says over the years has spent around £40,000 with the display and electrics.

The UK's 'most festive pub' has become home to a 26-foot snowman made of 2,500 wine bottles lights this festive season. The Queen Victoria Inn in Priddy, Somerset, has been putting on Christmas lights displays for the past decade - as a way to raise funds for charity. This year the popular pub features a huge wreath on the side of the building, a Christmas tree and a snowman made from hundreds of empty wine bottles. Priddy, Somerset. Photo released December 17 2024. Britain’s 'most festive pub' has become home to a 26-foot snowman - made from 2,500 wine bottles. The Queen Victoria Inn in Priddy, Somerset, has been putting on Christmas lights displays for the past decade - as a way to raise funds for charity. This year the popular pub features a huge wreath on the side of the building, a Christmas tree and a snowman made from hundreds of empty wine bottles. The pub is also covered in 55,000 Christmas lights collected over the years and 15km of cabling.
The UK's 'most festive pub' has become home to a 26-foot snowman made of 2,500 wine bottles lights this festive season. (Tom Wren / SWNS)

"It adds up but it does ok and the charity does really well out of it," he said.

"All the bulbs are energy efficient - even the spotlights - so it does not go up as much as people think luckily.

"My electricity bill is £3,000 a month anyway - one hundred on top is not the worry." he laughed.

The display has raised more than £25,000 for Children’s Hospice South West in the past five years.

This year Mr Walton is hoping to raise over £5,000.

He said: "With Christmas it is a good time to remember that some people are not having such a great Christmas and the hospice does so much to support the families and the children.

"We have met a few of them over the years and it is heartbreaking."

The evening of the Christmas light switch-on on Friday, December 6, did not go as planned as the pub was robbed on the evening of the event.

However, Mr Walton confirmed that luckily most of the donations so far had come from the internet or were taken by card payment.

"It is not a great feeling," he said. "The hospice is not doing too badly out of it - there is lots and lots of so many generous people who put so much money from all over the country but I would rather not be robbed to do that."

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