As the head brewer at Little Brother Brewing in Greensboro, N.C., Stephen Monahan always had his eye out for what other beer makers were working on. Although it was two-thirds of the way across the country, Colorado held particular interest since Monahan had first started homebrewing here as a business administration student at the University of Denver.
In particular, he was fascinated by the sour beers produced by the nationally acclaimed Black Project Wild & Spontaneous Ales, which he could buy at a nearby bottleshop. So after moving back to Colorado in 2022 and hearing that Black Project had closed, Monahan asked about the now-vacant space, hoping to start his own operation.
This fall, Monahan plans to open Monolith Brewing, at 1290 S. Broadway, serving a wide range of beer styles, like IPAs, lagers and barrel-aged stouts, as well as sour ales.
“What an incredible legacy to take over,” he said. “I hope I can follow in their footsteps.”
That path will be easier to find since Black Project left behind the entirety of its brewing equipment, furniture, fixtures and even its beer, Monahan said. “It was as if they just walked out the door one day and didn’t come back. Everything was here.”
As a result, Monahan will use Black Project’s four-barrel brewing system and about 40 of the 130 wooden barrels that were on hand. He’ll also keep the coolship, an open-topped vessel used to ferment beer with naturally occurring yeast. He’s trading away some of the equipment and fixtures, however, including the bartop, which was made from an airplane wing. (That piece is going, appropriately, to the aircraft-themed FlyteCo Brewing, which has two Denver locations.)
The coolship and wooden barrels were the heart of the former brewery, which found immediate success when it opened in 2016, building a legion of fans who would line up for every new release. But by 2022, a combination of decreased foot traffic due to the pandemic, rising raw material prices, and a changing beer market made it impossible for owner James Howat to stay in business, according to a note he posted on social media. Black Project closed in September.
Monahan has experience with multiple styles and plans to brew some sour and mixed-culture barrel-aged beers, but the bulk of his beer program will be non-sour beers, all of which will incorporate as many local ingredients – malted barley, hops, yeast – as possible. Before starting Mononlith, he was the head brewer at Kodiac Brewery in Centennial, which just opened in January. Monolith will be the fourth brewery that he has helped to get started.
Other changes he plans to make include a makeover that will make the space more “light, bright and engaging.” He’ll also add a 100-foot-long mural and custom dark green marble bar top.
The brewery scene on South Broadway has undergone some changes over the past year. Although Black Project closed last September, a new brewery, called Public Offering, opened at 1736 South Broadway, in October. Then, last week, Dos Luces Brewing, which has been serving corn-based pulque and chica for the past five years, announced that it will close in July.
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