Glasgow’s craft beer scene has grown quickly and with the quality consistency the city’s food and drink culture tends to produce. Several breweries here have national reputations, and the taproom culture – drinking fresh beer at the source – is well established. These are the Glasgow breweries and beer bars worth your time and glass.
Drygate Brewing Co, Duke Street
One of Glasgow’s most visible craft beer operations, located in a purpose-built brewery and bar space adjacent to the historic Tennent’s Wellpark Brewery in the East End. Drygate brews a broad range from session ales through experimental sours and they rotate the tap list continuously. The bar and restaurant are well-designed and very accessible – a good entry point for craft beer novices and a reliable quality stop for experienced drinkers. The brewery tour gives context if you want to understand what you’re drinking.
West Brewing Company, Glasgow Green
Glasgow’s German-inspired brewery, based in the magnificent Templeton Building on Glasgow Green – an extraordinary Victorian building modelled on the Doge’s Palace in Venice. West brews strictly to the Reinheitsgebot German purity law: water, malt, hops, yeast. The results are clean, well-made lagers, weissbier, and seasonal German styles that represent the opposite end of the spectrum from West Coast hop-bomb IPAs. The bierhall is spacious, the food is good, and the building is one of Glasgow’s architectural highlights.
Clockwork Beer Co, Cathcart
South Side Glasgow’s local craft brewery. Clockwork has been brewing longer than many of the city’s newer operations and the experience shows – the core range is consistent and the seasonal and experimental beers are adventurous in well-calibrated ways. The pub setting is proper neighbourhood pub rather than industrial taproom. A South Side institution.
Shilling Brewing Co, Great Western Road
A West End brew pub with a converted church setting that is genuinely spectacular. The brewing kit is visible from the main bar, the beer list prioritises their own production, and the food is reliably good. One of Glasgow’s most impressive spaces for a long Saturday session.
The Pot Still, Hope Street
Primarily a whisky bar with over 700 expressions, but also maintains a serious cask ale and craft beer selection. For evenings when you want to explore both Scotland’s brewing traditions in one sitting, The Pot Still makes the case for Glasgow as the best drinking city in Britain.
Corrections
Spotted something wrong? Send a correction.
