Theresa Stanley
Rock House owners
Rock House Brewing owners Kevin Richey (from left), Danny Haddad, Merna Brown and Billy Hacker.
With its grand opening this Saturday, Dec. 17, Rock House Brewing is set to become the latest entrant into Lexington’s expanding craft beer scene and the newest draw for the city’s resurgent North Limestone neighborhood.
Rock House, located just off North Limestone at 119 Luigart Court, joins the growing roster of stores in the area, including Broomwagon Coffee + Bikes, Minton’s at 760, Fleet Street Hair Shoppe and Charmed Life Tattoo.
The Dec. 17 grand opening will kick off with a ribbon cutting at 11 a.m. The rest of the day will include a corn hole tournament from noon to 2 p.m., the University of Kentucky basketball game at 5 p.m., food trucks, live music and at least five Rock House beers on tap: Cream Ale, Red Rye IPA, Double IPA, American Pale Ale and a Christmas Warmer, along with a special limited release tapping at 7 p.m.
Despite being a bit tucked away off North Limestone, the owners say they liked several attributes about the property, including its zoning, the room for growth it allowed, as well as the neighborhood in which it resided.
“The Night Market is over here, and that brings in a huge crowd, and we really like the community,” said Merna Brown, one of the co-owners of Rock House. “There are a lot of small shops that are opening up around here, like Broomwagon, Bullhorn, Minton’s, [Lucie’s] Red Light. I feel like it’s more of a homey community where everyone wants to help each other out, so we kind of like that vibe.”
Brown co-owns the new business with her husband and brewer, Jon Brown, as well as Danny Haddad, Billy Hacker and brewer Kevin Richey.
Rock House’s “hidden” feel puts it in good company -- Country Boy, West Sixth, Blue Stallion, Ethereal, Life Brewpub and Mirror Twin are all somewhat off the beaten path.
Richey cited West Sixth as an example of a brewery that came into a quiet part of town and helped foster growth in the area.
When entering Luigart Court, two main buildings can be seen – the tap room and the warehouse, separated by a couple hundred feet.
Though it most likely won’t be completed by the grand opening, a 20-tap bar will be set up in the warehouse in the coming weeks. Despite the warehouse work being incomplete, beer still will be served in the warehouse during the Dec. 17 opening.
The tap room, a small building that used to be an office for Lexington Quarry, was built in 1923 and showcases the Rock House logo on the wooden ramp out front.
The minimalist, Tetris-style symbol, which was designed by fellow North Limestone company Bullhorn Creative, is a lowercase “r” and a lowercase backwards “h” that resembles a chair pulled up to a bar top.
The temperature-controlled warehouse, where the brewing equipment is set up, has picnic tables, a drop down projector screen, bathrooms and plenty of space for corn hole and other festivities. The space is also available to be reserved for private events.
The tap room is quite literally a rock house, made largely of limestone. Richey and Jon Brown are also music fans, making the name Rock House take on somewhat of a double meaning.
The theme carries over to the beers, with names such as Double Kick Drum (Double IPA), Groupie (Cream Ale), Riot Act (Red Rye IPA), and Roadie (American Pale Ale).
Other Rock House beers that made an appearance during their extended soft-opening include a Pumpkin Sour and Uncle Jon’s Brown Ale, which was brewed with hemp seeds, making them one of the few breweries in Kentucky to incorporate hemp into their beers.
“I already got some ideas to do other hemp beers,” said Richey, who started home-brewing 20 years ago. “I think I can put it in a pale ale and it would be pretty good.”
Richey added that small experimental test batches will be a big part of their tap rotation.
“We’re trying to get more people into experimentation and not drinking the same beer every day,” he added.
“People want to try different stuff,” said Merna Brown. “They want variety in their beer. That’s what craft beer is all about.”
Richey and Jon Brown met about two years ago at the Brewers of Central Kentucky Iron Mash – an Iron Chef-like competition where participants have to brew with surprise ingredients.
From there, Merna Brown brought in her cousin – Haddad – and Richey reached out to Hacker, who years prior told Richey if he ever started a brewery, he wanted to be a part of it. “Ever since I drank his beer,” said Hacker.
Rock House will carry beers by many of the other local breweries as well, and owners noted that it’s important for those in the craft brewing community to support each other.
“If there’s a fight of any sort, it’s against the Anheuser-Busch’s of the world,” said Richey. “We’re not going to win that fight on our own.”
Owners emphasized the diversity of the NoLi neighborhood as one of the area’s strong points, and look forward to fostering a brewery environment that acts as a melting pot of people and ideas.
“We want people of different interests to come in here, have a good time, drink a great beer and have fun,” said Hacker. “I’ve met customers through this whole process that I don’t think I would’ve ever met in my life. That’s the cool part about it. It’s a coming together of people over great beer. That makes me excited. I’m excited right now. I got chills thinking about it. That’s why we’re doing this.”
Theresa Stanley