AKRON, Ohio - R. Shea Brewing has been doing its thing since 2015, tucked into a strip of businesses in the Merriman Valley. It's been a steady popular destination, and now it's growing.

Really growing.

Ron Shea is scheduled to open his massive expanded operation in Canal Place close to downtown Akron on Monday, Oct. 7. The space - and there's a lot of that - is in the former B.F. Goodrich complex on S. Main Street. It's in the same building as Missing Falls Brewery, which opened last year.

Shea is moving from a 3.5-barrel system on Merriman Road to a 20-barrel system that looks tiny sitting in the 56,000-square foot space. Shea looked at many places to expand, but when he was shown the once thriving industrial space, he knew he found what he was looking for.

"This was more of an accident," he said. He was told "You probably won’t like this place," he recalled.

"I fell in love with this place the first time I saw it."

There's ample parking in the lot of the building that once held scores of workers throughout the facility. The brewhouse and fermenters are below the mezzanine level, which is where you walk in. That top level has tables, bar, a kitchen and a long drink rail overlooking the brewing equipment and a giant colorful graffiti mural that energetically screams: BEER.

The cavernous downstairs area has room for a barrel-aging program and holds about 400 people. Upstairs, capacity is about 300. The brewery can easily work as a private-event space, with plenty of room for weddings and other gatherings.

The bulk of the brewing will be done at the new place, he said, while the Valley location will be used for more experimental brews.

Shea said agricultural tires, even space-shuttle-program tires, went through the space where fermenters, tanks and barrels now stand.

"It’s a great historic spot," he said.

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R. Shea opens in the Valley

Missing Falls Brewery is open