Originally located on Lafayette Ave., Community Brew Works opened a substantially more expansive brewery with tasting room on Buffalo’s Lower West Side in 2017. Located in the old Schaefer Malt House on Seventh Street, the brewery was the first phase of the adaptive re-use of the 1880 structure by Pitoune Development.
Community Beer Works’ space is a 14,000 SF single-story former warehouse that contained enough junk to fill 11 thirty-yard dumpsters. Once cleared out, a collapsing roof then had to be stabilized. A new roof, along with skylights were installed. New concrete was poured for the sidewalk, the patio, and the loading zone. A 20-barrel system of U.S.-made tanks were installed giving the brewery the capacity for 5,000 annual barrels with room to expand in the future.
Along with the brewery, a 7,000 SF tap room and kitchen was created that opened up to the street through a garage door, with a patio out front and a courtyard patio in back. Outside, new exterior lighting was set up along with bike racks to encourage multi-modal transportation to the site, which had no onsite parking.
The second phase of the Schafer Malt House Lofts will see 32 apartments added to the adjoining building on the corner with construction starting in late-2019.
