Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Summertime… and the drinking is easy

Earnest Brew Works pairs beer with local artists

That’s how the song goes, right? No? Maybe Gershwin’s words should be rewritten for summer in Toledo. The local calendar is filled with summer events and beer definitely is a consistent focus. The summer heat has many seeking a change from the heavy IPAs, stouts, and porters that got them through the winter, searching instead for lighter, easy drinking brews. Earnest Brew Works provides an answer.

Summer Wheat/Summer Artist Series

EBW offers four wheat beers for the summer series: Hibiscus Summer Wheat, now pouring, with Raspberry Cream Summer Wheat, Blueberry Summer Wheat with Ginger and Honey, and Peach Summer Wheat following over the summer. EBW Co-founder Scot Yarnell refers the four selections as “very drinkable beers.”

The Earnest taproom in South Toledo, at Detroit and Byrne, buzzes with conversation, which is what Yarnell wants his taproom to be. “It’s not a bar,” he explains, “It’s a community.”

Jason Sanderson, a longtime member of the EBW community, is a high school art teacher. After repeated requests by Sanderson to design the taproom beer signs, Yarnell relented and allowed the taproom signage to be done by Sanderson.

“I treat it with a lot of reverence,” says Sanderson, “They [Yarnell and co-founder Keefe Snyder] put their faith in me.”

To get local artists involved in the Summer Wheat/Summer Artist Series, Sanderson wanted to “force people to have a conversation,” and to have that conversation “not centered around names, but centered around art.”

Following a sign

Natalie Lansese, painted the signage for the first beer in the Summer Wheat / Summer Artist collaboration. Lanese, currently the lead painter at Design Graphite + Build, the firm that made the animal models for the recently opened Museum of Natural History at the Toledo Zoo, also co-painted the Moses Fleetwood Walker mural downtown.

Lanese relates that the taproom sign for Hibiscus Summer Wheat “started with a palette inspired by lemons and hibiscus blooms and built the imagery from there, utilizing geometric patterns, DayGlo color, and collage.” Sanderson adds that Lanese is a “perfect fit” for the Hibiscus Summer Wheat because the beer “spoke to the vibrancy of her colors.”

The next taproom sign, for Raspberry Cream Summer Wheat, is currently being designed by street artist, Ken Dushane (who goes by Phybr). So stop by EBW and ask the bartender or another patron to point it out. Start the conversation and become part of the community.

Earnest Brew Works
4-10pm, Wednesday-Thursday.
4-11pm, Friday. Noon-11pm, Saturday.
4342 S Detroit Ave.
419-340-2589 | Earnestbrewworks.com

Recent Articles