Brooklyn's Wild East Brewing opening Canandaigua taproom

Lauded downstate brewery will create lager-focused destination taproom along North Main Street in Canandaigua.

One of the best breweries in New York will soon have a presence in the Finger Lakes.

Brooklyn-based Wild East Brewing, known for its slow and patient approach to both lagers and mixed fermentation creations, signed a lease to open a taproom in the former YMCA/Post Office complex along North Main Street in Canandaigua.

It marks another time where a downstate brewery is embracing the growth potential of the Rochester area. Orange County’s Tin Barn opened a location overlooking Seneca Lake in Yates County, while NYC-based Other Half and Big aLICe each expanded with locations in Ontario County. (Other Half is currently at work reimagining the former Young Lion Brewing facility on Lakeshore Drive in Canandaigua.)

Wild East fulfills a wildly exciting niche within the FLX beer scene. Sure, places like Frequentem and Steuben make incredible lagers, but Wild East is incredibly devoted to producing world-class Czech-style beers. And the Canandaigua spot will showcase that.

“We’ve always had this idea of having a second taproom. I think it was in our original business plan,” Wild East co-founder Tyler March said. “But having a second location in a more idyllic setting, somewhere that’s not as chaotic as the City, not as industrial, it aligns with our brand and the kind of beers we put out — a lot of farmhouse-style ales and a lot of European-influenced beers.”

“Between me and Holly (Diehl, Wild East’s head sales rep), we’re up there a lot and our brand does very well there,” brewery co-founder Lindsay Steen added. “We didn’t really see ourselves in any of the big cities up there, but we wanted to be in areas that had a lot of tourism. We were looking primarily at the Finger Lakes and Canandaigua came across as little more forward-thinking and supportive of development. Close proximity to Rochester, still part of all the alcohol tourism up there, good food.”

The brewery taproom will be one of the major pieces in the redevelopment of one of Canandaigua’s most recognizable and desirable properties, the former home of the local YMCA branch that was originally the local U.S. Post Office. According to the esteemed Mike Murphy in the Democrat and Chronicle, the project gained city approval earlier this week. And now a lease has been signed, so construction can begin. (Transparent admission: I partnered with the developer, Rochester-based, Capstone Development and Construction, last summer for sponsored content.)

Brett Taylor, March, and Steen launched Wild East in Brooklyn’s Gowanus neighborhood in December 2019 and immediately faced down the pandemic pause.

Wild East poured for the first time at the Rochester Real Beer Expo last year and will again participate in the 2024 edition. (There are less than 20 VIP tickets left and general admission are moving quickly. Get your act together and get on board!)

Steen said they have rough estimates of the size and layout of the space right now. But they’re working on finalizing designs. It’s unclear how much space will be devoted to cold storage and how much space a kitchen will require. Wild East is looking to partner with a chef to operate it.

“We don’t have exact drawings yet,” Steen said. “It’ll be pretty big.” (It’ll probably be in the neighborhood of 5,000 square feet.)

The pandemic provided the opportunity for Wild East to slow down. Taylor said Wild East filled a lot of oak barrels (yay saison!!) and knocked out 30-barrel batches of lager, specifically double decocted Czech-style lagers. Taylor said Brooklyn has a similar water profile to the Czech Republic. Wild East also has a great stable of traditional English-style beers and a burgeoning focus on West Coast IPAs.

Wild East Canandaigua will feature a full on-premise license, so it can serve spirits, wines, ciders, and cocktails. The license will also allow Wild East to pour beers from other respected breweries. Obviously, there will be a full assortment of Wild East beers. There won’t be an on-site brewery in Canandaigua. All production will remain in Brooklyn.

“The goal is to bring a small piece of Brooklyn up there,” Steen said. “We are going to try to mimic some of the features we have in our (current) taproom, like the U-shaped bar, some of those U-shaped booths.”

There will also be a stage for live music and multiple seating areas. A portion will have a lounge-like feel, while bigger tables will welcome families and larger parties.

The new Wild East spot will have a “lager-service bar” with multiple LUKR side-pull faucets. “There is so much more to the Czech lager experience than just side-pulls and we’re looking forward to bringing this to life in our new space,” Steen said.

With a wide assortment of English pub favorites, Wild East will feature cask pumps and nitro lines.

“We just want to make sure we showcase the variety we do and provide the service that is suitable for that style,” Steen said.

“I think we offer something for everybody,” Taylor, the head brewer, added. “Consistency, quality, variety of styles, those are the things that make us stand out.”

“It helps us fit in pretty well as a small piece of the brewing scene in Canandaigua,” Steen concluded. “As we all know, we’re not focused on hazy IPA. We always offer one or will offer one of our neighbor’ hazy on a line. There’s a lot of hazy pouring up there already. Kettle sours is something else we don’t do. There are people who do it really well up there.”

Don Lasher, Capstone CEO, previously stated construction work will begin in the fall. The majority of the work will involve reworking the interior of the 55,000-square-foot facility. The brewery taproom will hopefully open in the first half of 2025.

The YMCA moved to a new facility last fall. Lasher said the property is really a gateway to the city of Canandaigua, Canandaigua Lake, and the entire Finger Lakes region. The footprint also includes the former U.S. Post Office, which is probably the most recognizable part of the complex for those driving past.

The property won’t include any residential spaces. But the retail and commercial possibilities are still numerous. The complex could include a boutique hotel, meeting space, restaurant, and tons of other options.

Capstone owns other notable properties in Canandaigua, including the former Lisk industrial site, now the Factory 243 apartments and lofts (which includes Working Class Coffee). The developer also worked on the recently opened Rising Storm Brewing location at the historic Daisy Flour Mill in Penfield. Capstone also owns the old Daily Messenger newspaper office on Buffalo Street. Crews will fill in the swimming pool area of the former YMCA and use it for weddings and events. The brewery taproom, meanwhile, will be in the gym area and will face Main Street. There is the potential to add an outdoor patio seating area, too.

Lasher and Capstone closed on the property in August 2022. The Post Office was built in 1909, and the YMCA addition was added in 1959. The Post Office is roughly 16,000 square feet.

As CBRE Upstate NY’s Alex Amorese, a commercial real estate associate who is working with Lasher on the project, said last year, they were seeking “a New York state-rooted brewery with a strong presence and following behind it” as the anchor for the project.

Mission accomplished.

“What we found in Brooklyn is a situation that benefits everybody,” Taylor said. “You have a good, strong local brand that stands out (Frequentem). You have a nationally renowned brand (Other Half). And then there’s us, the misfits in the middle.”