Ryan Dailey

Democrat staff writer

Dean Minardi made a splash in the local brewery scene last year when he opened Garages on Gaines, which houses GrassLands Brewing Company.

Now, Minardi has his sights set on transforming an old building in the All Saints district – one with significant local history – to set up shop with a new vodka and gin distillery.

The building was originally constructed as a Coca-Cola bottling plant and still dons the iconic Coca-Cola sign on a stone slab above its main door.

In recent years, the building might be most recognizable to local music fans who visited The Hop Yard, an open-air music venue that operated on the property from 2011 to 2015.

Minardi began explaining his vision for the new distillery, dubbed All Saints Distilling Company, as he removed the chain and padlock from the front door.

“We’ll go with as much of the red brick and steel as we can,” Minardi said. As he walked into the building's main room, he avoided water dripping through cracked skylights.

Ensley: The old Coke plant could help revive All Saints

The inside of the building is in a state of disrepair. Graffiti covered the walls. Most windows were broken.

Minardi, however, sees a gold mine of “character” in the structure and potential to become a new, refined hotspot.

“So what we’re going to do on this pad here is the whiskey tasting room,” Minardi said, facing the colorful, graffiti-laden wall visible from All Saints Street.

Passersby on All Saints, Minardi said, will be able to “actually look into the stainless and copper pot stills in the distilling room” through an exterior glass wall.

“This will be a half covered deck and half open terrace, and this is where our vodka lounge will be,” Minardi said, as he stood on the building’s roof. "We will be able to access and taste vodkas around the world and the All Saints Distilling vodka.”

One of the more interesting features he has in store for the building is a replica of the historic Calvin Phillips clock tower. The tower, built onto the home of reclusive architect Calvin C. Phillips, was built around 1910 and demolished in the late 1970s.

Touting the planned deck as one of the building’s main draws, Minardi said it’s all about location.

“You realize how close you are to being in the middle of downtown Tallahassee,” Minardi said from the building’s roof. “I mean there’s FAMU, we’re right in the middle of the freakin’ city.”

Minardi said he hopes to have the building renovation complete within 12 months and vodka to be available 12 months after that.

History of the building

The All Saints bottling plant was constructed in 1940 by businessmen Lewis Lively and his partner H.O. Hill. Lively founded Lively Vo-Tech in 1931; Hill was the father of a prominent Tallahassee banker and his grandson is Tallahassee surgeon Lou Hill. The two men owned Middle Florida Ice House and the Coca-Cola franchise. The ice house was beside the railroad, next door, south of the bottling plant.

During World War II, the two men amicably broke up their partnership, with Lively taking the Coca-Cola franchise and Hill the ice house. It wasn't the uneven trade it sounds: In the 1940s, Coca-Cola was not yet the international consumer giant it is today and ice for railroad cars and cold storage lockers was still a very lucrative business.

When Lively took over the Coca-Cola company, he turned over operation to his two sons-in-law: Leonard Wesson and Wilson Carraway. Wesson later became a Tallahassee city commissioner and namesake of a Tallahassee elementary school; Carraway, became a state senator and introduced the legislation to turn Florida State College for Women into the co-educational Florida State University.

Rebuilding a real thing: Coca-Cola building gets new life