The East Village's Newest Brewpub Taps January Opening Date

Because it's Beer Week, our readers asked us to check in with Half Door Brewing Company; when we last heard from the new East Village brewpub, it was seeking someone to head up the kitchen. Flash-forward nine months and it finally has chef, and an opening date.

Half Door will launch on January 9 at the corner of 9th and Island, in a 4,000-square-foot house that's over 100 years old; Creative House, a diversified investment and development company owned by Douglas Hamm, bought the property in 2010 with the vision to ultimately create a bar/restaurant on the prime corner. Hamm worked with Stacy and Dan Drayne, siblings whose family runs The Field, to convert it into what is likely to be a new hot spot in East Village. In keeping with their roots, the new brewery restaurant is Irish inspired, but the food and design will be more refined than their Gaslamp pub.

Dan, a brewer with Coronado Brewing Company, will oversee a double-decker 10BBL brewhouse that'll be visible through via glass windows from the restaurant's elevated front patio. Half Door Brewing Company will open with four to five house beers, including a pale ale, an IPA, Irish stout and Berliner Weisse, while the rest of the 20 taps inside their main bar and dining room will filled with guest beers.

Phase two of the brewpub, post-opening, will include an 10-tap outdoor bar and a second dining room on an upper level with another 20-tap bar.