Four new breweries are joining the beer scene.

Pipeworks Brewing Co. | Best Chicago Microbrewery nominee | 2013 Eat Out Awards

Photo: Allison Williams

Pipeworks Brewing Company

Pipeworks wants you to think of its brewery, opening in November at 1675 North Western Avenue in Bucktown, as something akin to your neighborhood bakery. Come by any given day and the boutique brewery may offer growlers of an IPA brewed with citrus, or perhaps a 22-ounce bomber of imperial stout barrel-aged with maple syrup. The constantly rotating selection and small production capacity (Pipeworks will make only 500 barrels in its first year) allow head brewmaster Beejay Oslon and his business partner Gerrit Lewis to play with ingredients and “meet with our consumers face-to-face and get feedback on what they’re into,” Oslon says.

The 2,500-square-foot brewery, made possible by $40,000 in funds from donation site Kickstarter and help from family, will serve mainly as a production facility, with 500 square feet carved out for retail (some bars and larger liquor stores may carry the beer in the future, Oslon says). It’s a modest space, but as Oslon and Lewis learned during a 2009 internship at De Struise brewery in Belgium, you don’t need an enormous facility with fancy equipment to make incredible beer. “Working in Belgium was really humbling because I learned that a lot of it was like glorified home brew with some of the equipment we were using,” Oslon says, “and the year we were out there [De Struise] had just been voted the number-one brewer in the world [by RateBeer.com].”—Laura Baginski

Follow Pipeworks’ progress on Facebook.