Everyone knows that the City of Brotherly Love truly loves its brews.
The city even has a whole week dedicated to the beverage. Philly Loves Beer typically throws Philly Beer Week annually, but obviously 2020 was a little bit different on that front. Now, with Philly reopening and Philadelphians getting back out onto the streets for some fun, the beloved event is back and ready to bring some suds all across the city.
“Philly Beer Week is the resurgence of Philadelaphia’s beer-drinking community with 10 delicious days to celebrate, learn and laugh over an amazing array of local beer,” says Christina Dowd, Executive Director of Philly Loves Beer. “Philly Beer Week always serves as an economic driver, drawing in beer drinking consumers from Philadelphia and the suburbs. It’s an opportunity to gather safely.”
According to their official site: Philly Loves Beer is a nonprofit that entertains, educates and engages consumers by hosting, producing and promoting beer events including Philly Beer Week, the nation’s oldest and largest beer week. Philly Loves Beer cultivates partnerships to benefit members and enrich the Greater Philadelphia Region’s authentic drinking experience.
That experience is back full throttle and ready to wow all thirsty Philadelphians from June 4 to 13. The Philly Beer Week 2021 tagline is “It’s Essential,” which is meant to capture the spirit and intent of the nation’s largest and oldest Beer Week to safely reunite a community of beer drinkers and showcase a fantastic array of craft beers.
There are in-person events happening during this jam-packed week full of suds, but one event—Opening Tap—is remaining virtual.
“We’ve reimagined Opening Tap this year, while we’d love to gather with 1,200 of our closest friends and sample beers from 50+ breweries, we’re gathering virtually with key locations in New Year’s Eve style countdown to ’tap’ and cheers as a community,” continues Dowd.
Opening Tap, the grand kickoff of Philly Beer Week, will be an interactive and virtual evening highlighting participating breweries, bars, and venues where participants can toast and celebrate. According to a release, Opening Tap participants can join in the celebrations at Love City Brewing’s Black is Beautiful Returns, a collaboration release party with Two Locals, Harris Family Brewery and Double Eagle Malt, along with Memphis Taproom’s debut of Kensington Trellis, a collaboration beer from New Trail Brewing and Warwick Farms with Breweries in PA.
But the first event is just the beginning.
Over the course of the 10-day event, there will be many unique happenings that span from tastings to happy hours, tap takeovers and live music, game nights to educational workshops, charity events, outdoor festivals and even a 5k run.
This weekend, diners can kick off their day in a spirited way with brunch from options like Lucky’s Last Chance’s locations featuring new releases from Founders Brewing, Jose Pistola’s All Allagash Day, Standard Tap’s Cider Brunch, or Devil’s Den Dog Days of Summer benefitting the Morris Animal Refuge.
When Dowd was asked what events she was most looking forward to, she had some ideas. “Lots of live music events – something we all missed! Human Robot’s LOGJAMMIN at Olde Kensington Biergarten, Live On Front by The International Bar, Neshaminy Creek turns 5 and Forsythia’s transformation into a sexy discotheque and the debut of a French Citywide.”
Music fans can check out live performances at Olde Kensington Biergarten for Human Robot’s LOGJAMMIN, Live on Front by The International Bar as Dowd mentioned above. Forsythia, Old City’s French hotspot will also be transformed into a sexy discotheque and debut the French Citywide – Amer Picon and Love City’s Unity IPA. On June 8, the Beer Busters podcast will be hosting a virtual happy hour, A Love Letter to Lagers, celebrating the history of this beer style. Beer drinkers who want to get in some exercise can participate in Iron Hill Brewery’s Run to the TapHouse 5k on June 12.
According to the release, in partnership with USciences, Philly Loves Beer will host a much-needed industry event on June 8, at Punch Line Philly at 2 p.m. titled Belly Up to the Bar – Critical Conversations for Change: Tips for discussing high stakes / critical issues in your workplace. Chantal Koechli and Matt Farber will lead the program with Melissa and Kevin Walter of Love City Brewing. Philly Beer Week and participating venues are committed to providing safe, entertaining, and engaging events that comply with local COVID mitigation measures and are safe and inclusive where all beer drinkers are free from harassment. Philly Loves Beer Event Code of Conduct is posted on the website and distributed to all participating venues.
With that in mind, Philly Beer Week has decided to support Brienne Allan, the Brewer and Production Manager at Notch Brewing of Salem, MA, (@ratmagnet on Instagram), who has provided an outlet for people to speak up and tell their stories of sexism, misogyny, harassment, and assault within the beer industry.
“There have been a lot of important conversations lately that stemmed from Brienne Allan’s (@ratmagnet) posts as an outlet for people to speak up and tell their stories of sexism, misogyny, harassment within the beer industry,” explains Dowd. “In response and to spur a change in behavior, Philly Loves Beer developed a Code of Conduct that was adopted by Board Members and an Event Code of Conduct for participating breweries, bars and venues. We want to ensure that Philly Beer Week events are safe and harassment-free.”
For more information, visit phillylovesbeer.org
