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Garage Project’s Hāpi Festival and Symposium was held earlier this year in
the lead-up to New Zealand’s hop harvest.
The symposium and festival form the public-facing side of a hop-breeding
initiative Garage Project has undertaken with New Zealand’s Freestyle
Farms, and with backing from the country’s Ministry for Primary Industries.
Over the course of a day in Wellington’s famous Museum of New Zealand Te
Papa Tongarewa, speakers such as Alexandra Nowell from Three Weavers
Brewing Company, Matt Brynildson from Firestone Walker Brewing Company, and
Paul Jones from Cloudwater Brew Co. gave talks with a focus on hops. Good
Beer Hunting was there to capture a slice of the discussion.
Afterwards, the invited breweries poured for a small festival of 1,000
people. It was a surreal situation: seeing world-renowned breweries like
Trillium, Other Half, Hill Farmstead. Tired Hands and Cellarmaker serving
beer in New Zealand’s national museum.
***
Out of Wellington, New Zealand, Garage Project was launched in 2011 by
brothers Ian and Pete Gillespie and their friend Jos Ruffell. The trio
first made their presence known with the brewery’s “24/24” series: 24 beers
released in 24 weeks to an eager Wellington public.
Since then, Garage Project has made its name by continuing to push
boundaries with unusual creations and projects, such as layered beer
designed to imitate a flat white, making beers for the Royal New Zealand
Ballet, and even releasing a series of natural wines spiked with
Lactobacillus or aged on unusual oak. Over the next seven years, they will
also be working on the Hāpi project for the benefit of New Zealand’s hop
growing industry.
I had the chance to take Jos aside, as the festival was in full swing, so
he could share just what it was all about. Listen in. |