Brewery nearly ready at old Claussen Bakery

Greenville’s fast growing craft beer scene is getting a Christmas treat this year when the long-planned Upstate Craft Beer Company opens Dec. 26 in the historic former Claussen Bakery building on Augusta Street.

The brewery is a crown jewel in the historic Claussen redevelopment, which includes offices and McMillan Padzan Smith Architecture.

The brewery will combine a traditional brewpub and small kitchen with a unique make-your-own beer system. Home brewers can purchase supplies at the brewery, talk over ideas with brewer Chris Hardin and create their own ales and lagers, which will be bottled or kegged and taken home to drink.

At one time, the smell of fresh-baked bread filled the 40,000 square foot building at 400 Augusta St. Baker Johann Claussen started his baking empire in Charleston, before adding locations in Columbia, Greenville, Augusta and Savannah, Georgia.

The Greenville bakery opened in 1930 and most recently was turning out pizza dough, developer Stephen Navarro said.

The Claussens also operated their own brewery in Charleston. “We checked to see if they had any old recipes, but they didn’t,” Hardin said.

Navarro said he often drove by the old bakery when it was still in business and realized the potential for development. “I knew that someone would renovate it or tear it down,” he said. “I inquired about it, and found that was owned by a trust in Pennsylvania which agreed to sell it.”

The $7 million project involved gutting the building and transforming into a series of new spaces, mostly to be used as offices. The building is now 96 percent filled, with the brewery being the only retail business.

“It would have been a lot easier to tear it down and start over,” he said. “But it’s important to the fabric and structure of downtown to maintain the buildings that have character. They can never be replaced.”

Upstate Craft Beer also will have its own line of brews, starting with a “12 Beers of Christmas” lineup beginning Dec. 26, brewery owner Jack McDonald said.

The new brewery, which was partly backed by a successful $12,000 Kickstarter online fund-raising drive, will have two half-barrel brewing systems, The pub will serve guest beers and its own house ales and lagers including an American pale ale, a West Coast style Indian Pale Ale, a Belgian tripel and dubbel, at least one saison farmhouse ale, a sweet potato porter and more. “We have at least 20 recipes we will bring on in the first few months,” Hardin said.

But the make-your-own beer concept will be unique among Upstate breweries, or even those in nearby Asheville. Both veteran home brewers and novices can produce beers for off-premises consumption. The cost for a batch of basic beer will be around $150, though some specialty ales with higher-cost ingredients could cost $350-$400. The beer will either be bottled or kegged for the brewer.

A variety of beer ingredients will be sold including 80 different grain varieties, 70 types of hops and 50 yeast strains, McDonald said.

Upstate Craft Beer is one of many new Upstate brewing companies coming online. Carolina Bauernhaus Ales just opened in Anderson. Other new breweries are Birds Fly South, 13 Stripes, Fire Forge, Loose Reed and Golden Grove, Hub City Taphouse opened in September in Spartanburg.