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A brewer holding a glass of unfiltered beer up to the light between fermentation tanks

Brewery Story No. 02

Greismüllers Altstadtbrauerei

Regensburg • Bavaria • Est. 2020

Chapter One

The Brewers

Two brewers standing together beside a wooden barrel, one holding a glass of beer — Two men, one brewery

The head brewer standing beside a wooden barrel with a glass of beer — The brewer, and the glass that answers for the day's work

A young brewer in working clothes standing beside a wooden barrel — Next in line, straight off the brewhouse floor

Chapter Two

From Malt to Mash

A brewer pouring malt from a sack into a bin in the malt store — Malt, weighed out by hand

A brewer emptying a sack of grain into the open mash tun — Mashing in — the first hour of the brew day

A young brewer opening the lid of the Brewiks mash tun — The lid comes off

A brewer stirring the mash with a wooden paddle — Turned by hand, with a wooden paddle

Chapter Three

The Craft

A brewer filling a keg from the fermentation tank, a full glass standing nearby — Straight from the tank into the keg

A brewer standing among kegs and tanks holding a glass of beer — The narrow aisle between the tanks

A young brewer cleaning inside an open fermentation tank — The last work of the day, inside the tank

Chapter Four

The Brewery

The lettered facade of Griesmüllers Altstadtbrauerei with lanterns and a gilded angel — Lanterns, lettering and a gilded angel

A brewer standing in the doorway of the pink Griesmüllers Altstadtbrauerei building — In the doorway of the Altstadtbrauerei

The Griesmüllers Altstadtbrauerei sign hanging over an old town lane beside a church — Est. 2020 — hanging over the old town lane

From Brewery to Bottle

There is something satisfying about watching a beer make its final journey.

At Griesmüllers, I wanted to photograph those moments that normally happen unnoticed — the hands working with the bottles, the labels being applied, the machinery moving constantly, and the people keeping everything flowing.

After seeing the beer being brewed and cared for in the brewery, it was interesting to see it take its final form.

A bottle comes through empty.

Then it is filled, capped, labelled and moved along the line.

What looks simple from the outside is a combination of people, machinery, timing and experience.

And somewhere in the middle of all that movement, you can still see the hands of the people behind it.

That is what I wanted to photograph.

Not just the finished beer, but the journey it takes to get there.

— Marden Smith

Brown bottles being filled with beer under the filling heads, a brewer watching in the background — The bottles fill, one row at a time

A young brewer spraying and preparing the bottling machine before filling begins — Before the first bottle — cleaning down the filler

Hands lifting crown caps out of a stainless steel tray beside the bottling line — Crown caps, counted out by hand

A brewer placing filled brown bottles into blue crates beside the fermentation tanks — Filled bottles into the crate

A brewer hosing down crates of freshly filled bottles on the brewery floor — Rinsed down, crate by crate

Hands applying a Kreuzter Pale Ale label to a bottle at the old labelling machine — The label goes on, by hand and by press

A young brewer holding a freshly labelled bottle beside the labelling machine — The finished bottle, straight off the press

A bottle of Schanzer Hell beside a full, freshly poured glass with a thick head of foam — Schanzer Hell — poured and ready

A Griesmüllers Altstadtbrauerei six-pack carrier with bottles and a Jahrgangsbock tag — The packaged beer, ready to take home