diff --git a/doc/source/whatsnew/v0.17.1.txt b/doc/source/whatsnew/v0.17.1.txt
index 736554672a089..f9ae7c32e956c 100755
--- a/doc/source/whatsnew/v0.17.1.txt
+++ b/doc/source/whatsnew/v0.17.1.txt
@@ -42,3 +42,10 @@ Performance Improvements
 
 Bug Fixes
 ~~~~~~~~~
+
+
+- Bug in ``HDFStore.append`` with strings whose encoded length exceded the max unencoded length (:issue:`11234`)
+
+
+
+
diff --git a/pandas/io/pytables.py b/pandas/io/pytables.py
index ac2358cb3d231..4de641bb67926 100644
--- a/pandas/io/pytables.py
+++ b/pandas/io/pytables.py
@@ -1860,7 +1860,8 @@ def set_atom_string(self, block, block_items, existing_col, min_itemsize,
                     )
 
         # itemsize is the maximum length of a string (along any dimension)
-        itemsize = lib.max_len_string_array(com._ensure_object(data.ravel()))
+        data_converted = _convert_string_array(data, encoding)
+        itemsize = data_converted.itemsize
 
         # specified min_itemsize?
         if isinstance(min_itemsize, dict):
@@ -1877,10 +1878,7 @@ def set_atom_string(self, block, block_items, existing_col, min_itemsize,
         self.itemsize = itemsize
         self.kind = 'string'
         self.typ = self.get_atom_string(block, itemsize)
-        self.set_data(self.convert_string_data(data, itemsize, encoding))
-
-    def convert_string_data(self, data, itemsize, encoding):
-        return _convert_string_array(data, encoding, itemsize)
+        self.set_data(data_converted.astype('|S%d' % itemsize, copy=False))
 
     def get_atom_coltype(self, kind=None):
         """ return the PyTables column class for this column """
diff --git a/pandas/io/tests/test_pytables.py b/pandas/io/tests/test_pytables.py
index df2a659100305..167170f7cd7c5 100644
--- a/pandas/io/tests/test_pytables.py
+++ b/pandas/io/tests/test_pytables.py
@@ -4292,6 +4292,22 @@ def f():
 
         compat_assert_produces_warning(PerformanceWarning, f)
 
+
+    def test_unicode_longer_encoded(self):
+        # GH 11234
+        char = '\u0394'
+        df = pd.DataFrame({'A': [char]})
+        with ensure_clean_store(self.path) as store:
+            store.put('df', df, format='table', encoding='utf-8')
+            result = store.get('df')
+            tm.assert_frame_equal(result, df)
+
+        df = pd.DataFrame({'A': ['a', char], 'B': ['b', 'b']})
+        with ensure_clean_store(self.path) as store:
+            store.put('df', df, format='table', encoding='utf-8')
+            result = store.get('df')
+            tm.assert_frame_equal(result, df)
+
     def test_store_datetime_mixed(self):
 
         df = DataFrame(