PEERING INTO THE FUTURE
Breweries bloomed and boomed across Western Pennsylvania in 2018, especially in the first half of the year, and 2019 looks to hold at least two dozen additional openings and other big events here. This after a 2018 where the number
of breweries nationally grew about 20 percent to more than 7,000, according to the Brewers Association trade group, which estimates 1,000 of them opened last year.
One of the biggest new ones in our region will be the new Cinderlands brewery and restaurant in the Strip District, to which the owners referred in December as Cinderlands Warehouse. It’s being built inside what’s left of the former Spaghetti Warehouse at 2601 Smallman St. Cinderlands Beer Co. opened in December 2017 on Butler Street in Lawrenceville, just 11 long blocks away. That place will remain open and brewing.
But they’ll be able to make and serve much more beer at this new place, with a stacked 15-barrel brewhouse that’ll be open to 250-plus diners and drinkers on two floors, plus another 50-plus on the second-floor deck. All that’s left of the original old building are the red brick outer walls. This new restaurant is much more open and well-lit, thanks to the big windows, roll-up garage doors and sky lights.
Last month, Cinderlands teased its first big event at the new space on March 2, Juicy Brews Late Night, presented with Hop Culture Magazine, which quickly sold out VIP tickets ($94.95). Some general admission tickets ($64.95) were still available earlier this week.
Cinderlands managing partner Jamie Warden says the place won’t be open to the public by then, but it’ll be a lot farther along than it is now, and it will open this year.
A bombshell announcement hit last week when Cleveland-based Platform Beer Co. shared its plans to open a 10barrel brewhouse and tasting room with a kitchen in an 8,000-square-feet, two-story space at 4805 Penn Ave. in Garfield. That is to happen by this summer. (Mount Pleasant’s Helltown Brewing had in January 2017 announced it would open a taproom on that corner but did not do so.)
Another very interesting big new space, about which we also recently wrote, is the forthcoming production hub and taproom of Millvale’s Grist House Craft Brewery, which is in a 55,000-square-feet “bunker” at the former Nike missile site in Collier. Coowner Brian Eaton isn’t yet giving a timetable for opening the first craft brewery in a missile command center, but they already are aging barrels there and could at least be brewing at the location in 2019.
There are several other breweries set to open this year. Aiming for summer is Lincoln Avenue Brewery at 538 Lincoln Ave., the main drag of Bellevue, which until 2016 was a “dry” town where no establishment was able to sell alcoholic beverages. The restoration of the 1905 bank building to its brick-walled, tinceilinged charm is being done in great part by volunteers, who will be “paid” with growlers of beer.
The Dented Keg Brewing Co. also went public last week about starting construction to open in May at 650 Adams Shoppes in Butler County — 4,000 square feet of the former McGinnis Sisters Special Food Store — where it will serve its beer and cider with barbecue and other pub fare.
A destination not just because it’s farther away from Downtown Pittsburgh will be Riverside Brewing Co. at 1 Fountain St. in Cambridge Springs, Crawford County. This “maple brewery built on history” plans to open “around June” on the site of the historic Riverside Inn that burned down in May 2017. Riverside will be housed in a reconstructed 1890s timber-framed barn amidst the inn’s restored gardens and serve local foods with a strong emphasis on the owners’ maple syrup (they also run Howles Maple Farm). Jason Howles says they’ll emphasize outdoor
dining and events and events and eventually build a barn just for weddings. Also opening in the same town in May is Hardwaters Brewing at 278 S. Main St., beside Mr. Woody’s Smokin Bar-Bestination: Que.
Another destination: The Straub
Brewery in St. Marys, Elk County, will in late spring or so open a new visitors center and taproom that will sell some food and eventually will include overnight accommodations.
Also getting two breweries is Verona. This just in: The new name of one that had been Knurd Brewing is to be Acclamation Brewing. It will open at 555 Wildwood Ave. in a space it’ll share with the Pittsburgh Pickle Co. The other is at 751 E. Railroad Ave., a building the folks behind Inner Groove Brewing Co. acquired in October and are turning into a brewery and taproom that will be “a unique combination of craft beer and music.” Also, Stonewall Ciderhouse & Meadery aims to open at 723 Allegheny River Blvd.
The guys at McKees Rocks’ 412 Brewing, a production brewery not usually open to the public, are working on a former laundry at 847 Western Ave. that will be its taproom.
Richard Morgan aims to open his Rogan Brewing taproom on 214 W. Eighth Ave. in West Homestead, where he’ll serve beers he’ll brew in a space he’s working on in nearby Duquesne. “Shooting for getting some beer on select local taps around March,” he says. “Then, I’ll be working on the tap room.”
Hough’s in Greenfield closed its adjacent Copper Kettle Brewing Co., where customers used to brew their own beer, and will reopen as a brewery and coffee roastery. The Hough brothers also plan to open a bigger brewpub in a building they purchased at 4568 Penn Ave. in Bloomfield this fall or winter.
Across the Allegheny River in Etna, CoStar Brewing — it brews in a Highland Park garage — plans to open a brewery and taproom at 327 Butler St. Co-owner Dom Cincotta summed up their progress, and approach to publicity on it, as “slow and low.” The borough still was awaiting specifics from another proposed brewpub, at 381 and 399 Butler St., called the Rear End on Butler.
In Shaler, three guys aim to open Acrospire Brewing Co. at 1650 Butler Plank Road, in a warehouse section of a building that houses Kellner Stair and Rail. “We are currently in the process of building out our brewery with a goal to open in March 2019,” says business manager Eric Truscott. “Upon opening, we will be selling growlers and kegs for offsite consumption. Longterm plans are to expand to open a tap room for customers to sit, hang out and enjoy a pint or two.”
In the countryside outside Grove City, Big Rail Brewing Co. is working on its ambitious rustic brewpub, beer garden and music venue on 12 acres at 2158 Mercer Butler Pike.
In nearby Stoneboro, Mercer County, the guys at Lake Hill Brewing recently got their state license to brew on one’s farm. Michael Sayers says that while looking for a taproom location that people can visit, “We will be beginning to self distribute in the area to local bars, restaurants, and hopefully grocery stores and gas stations.”
Grove City’s Koehler Brewing Co. will open a second location in Ellwood City, also in Lawrence County (but owner Bruce Koehler isn’t ready to publicize details).
In nearby New Castle, Croaker’s Kegs & Corks, a brewing and winemaking supply store, plans to open Croaker’s Brewing Co. at its current location at 2017 W. State St. in Union Township.
Invisible Man Brewing plans to open early in the year in downtown Greensburg. It has a pending license for 132 S. Pennsylvania Ave.
In Irwin, New Crescent Brewing Co. just announced it’s opening Feb. 2 at 229 Main St. The name is an homage to the town’s last brewery, Crescent Brewing, which was shut down by Prohibition in 1919.
By fall, Sobel’s Obscure Brewery, which makes its beers at Latrobe’s City Brewing Co., plans to open its own brewery and taproom in the former Gillespie’s department store building at 500 Clay Ave. in downtown Jeannette. After closing on the building in December, the Sobel family said they’re planning to offer 17 S.O.B. beers and three guest taps to consume there, growlers and six packs to go, and music and food trucks on weekends in a space as quirky as its gnome-themed packaging. In the meantime, they’re working in a Pilot Brewing Lab in town, which also is home to their warehouse.
In Shippenville, Clarion County, a new building will house a husbandand-wife’s Lost in the Wilds Brewing Co. at 21964 Route 66.
Up in Erie, the owners of several U Pick 6 bar restaurants will, by spring or summer, reopen the one at 7520 Peach St. as the John Russell Brewing Co. Brew House & Restaurant.
The Rivertowne Brewing production brewery in Export is not new, but it does have a new owner, as it was acquired in November by Helltown Brewing Co. of Mount Pleasant, also in Westmoreland County. The new owners will start brewing Helltown there at some point, but in the meantime, the brewery taproom has been open, serving both Helltown and Rivertowne brews that will continue to be made.
There are other breweries in the works — such as Allusion in Vandergrift — that could open in 2019, and there could be some that aren’t yet public. Existing breweries will have news from adding canning lines to opening satellite taprooms that principals don’t yet want to talk about. The federal government shutdown could hold up some licensing.
Established East End Brewing Co. plans to, any day now, open its new kitchen at its Larimer headquarters that will serve food from Justin Severino (and hence, no more dogs are allowed inside). And the North Side’s Penn Brewery is very close to opening its Downtown taproom at 432 First Ave.
In terms of big beer events, several have set dates and started selling tickets, including the Steel City Big Pour, the 13th of which is on Sept. 28.
Back for its second year will be Fresh Fest on Aug. 10 at Nova Place. Tickets for that event, featuring blackowned breweries and collaborators and special guest Brooklyn Brewery brewmaster Garrett Oliver, go on sale Feb. 1. Co-sponsoring Black Brew Culture online magazine looks to launch in February, too.
Returning after a five-year break is Eastern Ohio’s The Big Tap In Real Craft Beer Festival, which will be held in Girard on April 27 and once again benefit non-profit Project MKC.
Sometime this year, the folks who want to open Brew: The Museum of Beer in Pittsburgh plan to open a sort of preview version — an exhibit on “The Story of Beer in Pennsylvania.” The interactive exhibit, which will tell that story with everything from artifacts to video interviews, aims to be a hub for talks, tastings and other events when it opens, they hope, Downtown. The exhibit is being funded by nearly $60,000 from the state Beer Marketing Board. The folks behind the National Beer Museum Development Group are still looking for a site for the full forprofit museum.
In the meantime, it is preparing an exhibit on “Beer in World War II” that will open on Feb. 9 at West Overton Village and Museum in Scottdale, Westmoreland County, as part of the Senator John Heinz History Center’s traveling WWII exhibit, “We Can Do It.”
We’ll write more about these openings as they happen. In the meantime, you can find area breweries on the Post-Gazette’s interactive map at https://newsinteractive.post-gazette.com/drink-map.