Thursday, May 2, 2024

Asheville's Original Craft Brewery

highland brewing company old charlotte highway asheville nc

Not getting metaphorically flattened is part of why Wong Ashburn was brought in to succeed Wong as head of the brewery — though if she had her way, Highland would have been a true family business far earlier. Wong Ashburn made several attempts to join the company in the brewery’s first decade, including as a local beer seller, but Wong says he didn’t think it was the right thing for her to do at that time. The brewhouse has the third largest solar array of any craft beer brewery in the US, and the 13th largest brewery solar array in the world.

New York Times

But unlike so many fly-by-night microbrewers gone rogue, the first of the many Asheville, NC breweries now has a quarter of a century to its name. Let us craft an authentic brewery experience for your next special occasion. Private event venues include the Rooftop, Event Center and Barrel Room. A vast tree-lined space with shady table seating and a lush lawn to bring your own chairs. The Meadow bar is open for the summer featuring our year-round and small batch beers; cider and wine also available.

Warm up in Asheville with these cold weather brews - Citizen Times

Warm up in Asheville with these cold weather brews.

Posted: Wed, 02 Nov 2016 07:00:00 GMT [source]

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At the time of opening, Highland Brewing Company was Asheville’s first legal brewery since Prohibition. You’ll want to make plans to party with us and raise a glass to Asheville’s first brewery, founded in 1994. Parking is limited and will be $10 per vehicle upon arrival (we recommend ride share!).Want to party in style with a parking pass, exclusive VIP-only venues, private bar areas, and serious swag? Having maxed out brewing capacity at its downtown basement, Highland moved to East Asheville in 2006, taking over the former home of Blue Ridge Motion Picture Studios.

Year-Round Beers

You can take your pup for a hike on Highland's hiking trail, play a game of volleyball, or challenge a friend to a round of disc golf. And when you need something to toast your victory with, you’ll have around 20 options to choose from. There, they created such beverages as Celtic Ale (later Gaelic Ale), St. Terese’s Pale Ale and Oatmeal Porter, which were served upstairs at Barley’s and bottled by hand for local distribution. The facility also has a concert stage, taproom, event venue, rooftop bar, and massive outdoor space.

“But I changed my mind when I visited New Belgium [Brewing Co. in Fort Collins, Colo., circa 2000]. They said, ‘Fat Tire [Amber Ale] is 87% of our business.’ At the time, Gaelic Ale was two-thirds, maybe just over 50% of ours. These humorous recollections and other memories are on Wong’s and Wong Ashburn’s minds this year as Asheville’s longest-running brewery celebrates its 30th anniversary. Ashevillebreweries.comthrives to provide an ethnography of the beer scene surrounding the Asheville area. Wong says that the company began as a hobby in the basement of Barley’s Taproom.

Location

She officially joined Highland in 2011 and became company president in 2015. Under her leadership, the brewery underwent a brand refresh in 2018, trading bagpipe-and-beer-toting Scotsman “Scott” for a crisp, clean, compasslike logo. Wong is quick to rattle off facts and figures from those early years but otherwise notes he isn’t much interested in revisiting the brewery’s past.

Highland Brewing Downtown Taproom

Complimentary guided walking tours of the facilities are available every day of the week. They last around 45 minutes, and include a beer tasting to celebrate the occasion. Amongst the many Asheville brewery tours we’ve taken, the Highland Brewery tour ranks right up there with the best.

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highland brewing company old charlotte highway asheville nc

Wong and McDermott liked the balanced flavor of the English brown ale base but didn’t know the creation would be “it” as far as a flagship brew went. Wong says that status came along more naturally and actually dawned on him a few years into Highland’s run when he was ready to try new things and possibly take the brewery in a different direction. After visiting North Carolina for the first time, Senior Writer Jonathon Engels and wife Emma spent 2 years exploring Western NC in search of a homestead property.

Woman-owned, operated recording studio opens on Highland Brewing campus in Asheville - Citizen Times

Woman-owned, operated recording studio opens on Highland Brewing campus in Asheville.

Posted: Fri, 29 Mar 2024 07:00:00 GMT [source]

Explore The Brewery

Spacious & friendly, the Taproom showcases our year-round beer lineup as well as our rotating small-batch brews. CloseFrom concerts to fitness classes, our stage is home to talent from Asheville and beyond. Asheville-based food truck serving Southern inspired & locally sourced fare!

highland brewing company old charlotte highway asheville nc

As a perennial feature on Asheville beer tours and one of the city’s best breweries, Highland Brewing Co doesn’t really need to do much more to get noticed. And yet they do, with their many community-minded and environmentally aware initiatives. In 2020, Highland will also be opening a second site in downtown Asheville, at the S&W Cafeteria.

The packaging hall is where we put our beer into bottles and cans. Changing any of the form inputs will cause the list of events to refresh with the filtered results. Visit our hilltop brewery and see what else goes on beyond fermentation. Additionally, they repurpose spent grains as cow feed, use repurposed materials for some of their brewing systems, and have several mindful operating protocols to minimize energy usage and waste. But the Highland Brewing Company was the very first Asheville brewery.

The moniker also represents the pioneering brewery’s 40-acre hilltop campus that includes a taproom, performance stage, grassy meadow, volleyball courts, hiking trail, and disc golf course. In a city that has more breweries per capita than anywhere else in the U.S., it’s a testament to the beer and the people behind it that Highland is still the local favorite. In 2015, she took over as CEO, and the man often referred to as Asheville’s godfather of craft beer finally got his long-awaited retirement wish—just 10 years and one multimillion dollar company later.

After spending years owning and running a Charlotte-based engineering firm that designed nuclear waste facilities, Wong bought a house in the sleepy mountain town of Asheville and was ready to settle into a slower-paced life. Instead, his home brewing hobby snowballed, and next thing he knew, he was opening a brewery. That mix of consistency and innovation has proved key to Highland’s sustained operations in an ever-changing industry. One notable exception is the popular Cold Mountain Winter Ale, which intentionally evolves slightly from year to year with different ingredients. Highland is now the largest family-owned brewery in the Southeast, and currently run by Oscar’s daughter, CEO Leah Wong Ashburn. Visiting Highland should be a big draw for anyone doing Asheville tours.

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