The Wild Beer Co announces exciting collaboration projects for the year ahead. The first of these is called The Cellarman Project – Wild Beer Cask Collaborations. Subsequent projects including ‘Tales From The Wood’ and US projects will be announced over the next two weeks.
To collaborate:
synonyms: cooperate, join (up), join forces, team up, get together, come together, band together, work together, work jointly, participate, unite, combine, merge, link, ally, associate, amalgamate, integrate, form an alliance, pool resources, club together
To us at the Wild Beer Co, collaboration is a key element to our business. However, each of these joint efforts has to have a story or a rationale as to why we are engaging in the spirit of collaboration.
It’s about sharing knowledge, improving our skill sets through others learning’s. It’s about partnering with talent from around the globe as well as on home soil. It’s about bettering ourselves and ultimately improving the beer that we brew.
These are not vanity projects nor are they financially driven schemes.
They are an exploration in expression of creativity, taste and flavour and challenging perceptions of what good beer should be.
This years collaborative efforts will include an array of projects across blending and barrel ageing, both here and the US and Europe as well as a series of limited cask partnerships. We’ve curated these collaborations carefully, as we feel that not only is there a huge learning potential in working with these breweries but it also shows a statement of our intent as a leading European farmhouse style brewery.
The Cellarman Project – Wild Beer Cask Collaborations
We are proud to announce that the partners for our cask collaborations this year will be Magic Rock (UK), Left Handed Giant (UK), Ignition Brewery (UK), Fullers (UK), Budvar (CZ), and Brooklyn Brewery (USA).
Let us introduce Brewer Russell Sykes who has been instrumental in curating this project and will lead the brews.
‘Collaborations provide us, as brewers, with opportunities to share knowledge and experiences; develop and refine our skills; and further expand our horizons. So in choosing our collaboration partners, we have not been constrained by geography; size or market segmentation. Instead, we have sought out those whose ethos and passion we share; who will push our boundaries and their own; and who believe great cask beer is worth investing in.
It is also about highlighting the importance of how we not only produce our beer but how we look after it and maintain it once it rests in the venues cellar.
The job of the cellarman is crucial in carrying the baton of the beer effectively from cellar to pump – this appreciation is what cemented the project idea between ourselves and Garrett Oliver at Brooklyn.
Each of the beers produced in this series will bring something wildly different to the market. Each will be a unique sum of the parts brought into the collaboration, the combination of our ideas and identities at this moment in each brewery’s development. Through this, we will add our collective weight to the argument that cask beer is capable of being more than the cheapest pint at the bar’.
So without further ado, let us introduce our partners in this exciting project:
Left Handed Giant (UK) : We wanted to keep a percentage of the line up local to us in Somerest. We respect their beers, and are just good friends, so it was an obvious choice. http://www.lefthandedgiant.com
Magic Rock (UK) : Still a big champion of cask beer in the UK, leaders in innovation and again great friends. This is a second collaboration this year with our pals from Huddersfield and will showcase at their SeshFest in June.
Ignition Brewery (UK) : Taking a wildly different approach to beer and brewing can yield amazing results. Ignition exemplifies this. Through its social enterprise model, Ignition provides both meaningful employment to people with learning difficulties and beers we can all enjoy. We hope to use our presence in the market to shine a light on the fantastic work done by social enterprise breweries around the UK and to encourage their inclusion within craft brewing’s culture of collaboration.
Ignition will be joining us at The London Craft Beer Festival in August, to launch and serve our collaboration http://ignition.beer
Fuller’s (UK) : Obviously we have huge respect for what is one of the most recognisable breweries in the UK. Their lesser spotted Gales Prize Old Ale has been an inspiration to our flagship beer Modus Operandi and a beer that marks Fuller’s out as one of the original ‘craft’ beer companies. https://www.fullers.co.uk
Budvar (CZ): Leftfield is something we often come across as, and Budvar was one of the names that came up in the “who would we want if we could have anyone” conversation – they were really keen to come and play with beer in a different way. We think you’d be surprised how much craft or specialty beer the employees at Budvar drink / talk about. http://www.budweiserbudvar.co.uk
Brooklyn Brewery (USA) : What started as a conversation on appreciating good cellarmanship and beer quality between Brooklyn Brewmaster Garret Oliver and our own Brett Ellis, has led to this partnership with one of the Godfathers of the modern craft scene. http://brooklynbrewery.com/about/about-the-brewery
Further information: Simon Dehany, simon@wildbeerco.com