Brewing August opened their doors at the end of last month, launching a soft opening. Walking distance from Granville Island, the brewery was hitting it out of the park during the long weekend.

From left to right: Tate Lillies, Travis Rea, and Adam Jones are the three men behind the beach-y Brewing August. Courtesy of Brendan Kergin/Vancouver Is Awesome

Tate Lillies, Travis Rea and Adam Jones, are friends and newcomers to the brewing scene.

“We’re starting up kinda bare-bones,” says Lillies. “The idea behind the brand is a beach vibe, summer vibe; August in Vancouver. We’re trying to set up a brewery around that.”

The new space brews their four mainstays and new experiments in a six-tank system. Currently, they’re brewing batches at Patina Brewing in Port Coquitlam, but their own system should be operational shortly.

“We want that vibe of hanging out at the beach in the summer, in BC, in Vancouver,” Lillies says. “As we started looking at what we wanted the brand to be, we all have families, we enjoy breweries that don’t feel like a bar, it feels more like a community gathering space.”

“Being about August and summer and beach and picnic, typically everything is going to be on the lighter end,” he said. “We may do a darker beer in the winter, we’ll see.”

“We decided to have a petting zoo upstairs,” Lillies says, laughing. “No, we’re limited in the amount of licensed space we have. We wanted to keep it as open as possible and use space that was inviting.”

In addition, Las Autenticas will be making food in a nearby commissary kitchen to order, with food being delivered to tables in Brewing August.