New coordinates logged on Milwaukee’s West Side: Tree Line Brewing opens Friday, Nov. 27, at 7100 W. Center St. in the Enderis Park neighborhood. Its website lists the grand opening, and the brewery is the first of its own for Nick Guthery, most recently head brewer at Broken Bat Brewing in Walker’s Point.
OnMilwaukee toured the space for an Oct. 30 first look. It’s a former savings-and-loan building, built in the 1950s according to Guthery, and decorated around his love of U.S. national parks. He proposed to his wife at the top of Rocky Mountain National Park, he told the site.
Inside Tree Line Brewing
- Brewhouse: a five-barrel, all-electric system behind a wooden half-wall
- Taps: eight lines, with seven pouring at opening
- Bar: room for about a dozen stools, plus a carry-out cooler
- Extras: a small stage for live music, a reading nook with kids’ books, games and a roughly 500-square-foot patio
- Food: no kitchen. There’s a dedicated food truck space and snacks, and Guthery plans to seek a license for things like frozen pizza later
What Tree Line Brewing will pour
Guthery isn’t locking in flagships until he sees what the neighborhood likes. He told OnMilwaukee he’s planning a golden ale with lemon, an amber ale, a hazy IPA and a pale ale. A lager will take the eighth tap once it finishes fermenting. Soda, a hop water and a hard seltzer round out the opening list.
Beer to go comes in bottles from a small filler on wheels. A punch card rewards customers for every six bottles they bring back, part of a set of green practices that also includes permeable patio pavers and natural carbonation, Guthery said.
The last part in transit
When OnMilwaukee visited, only one thing was holding up the opening: the control panel that runs the electric brewhouse. Guthery said the part was due that day and that he’d drive to Cleveland to pick it up, then install and test it. The Nov. 27 date was still on the brewery’s website as of Nov. 1.
Hours and opening day
The brewery’s website lists these hours:
- Wednesday-Friday: 3-9 p.m.
- Saturday: noon-9 p.m.
- Sunday: noon-7 p.m.
- Monday-Tuesday: closed
Note that Nov. 26 is Thanksgiving, so opening day lands on the Friday after. Elsewhere in the brewery-opening queue, our report on Alvarado Street Brewery Castroville follows another taproom waiting on its final sign-off.
A national park on Center Street
Tree Line is a small, neighborhood-scaled brewery with a clear identity: national-park decor, a rotating lineup instead of fixed flagships and a bottle-return program. If the brewhouse panel cooperates, Enderis Park gets its new third place the day after Thanksgiving. Our sensors will check back on opening weekend.
Transmission complete.
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