On Bamberg, winter drinking sports and seasonal spiced wine from Old 502.

Just this morning, we were talking about our Christmas (2009) in Bamberg, Germany, and the endearing custom there (and elsewhere in Northern Europe) of ignoring the chilly weather and drinking outdoors at or near the weeks-long Christmas market -- also held outdoors. Beer and spirits are available, but it seems like most of what is consumed is mulled wine. They've only been doing it for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years.

The memory has some wheels spinning. Perhaps a truncated outdoor Christmas winter solstice market in downtown New Albany? It's too good of an idea to entrust to the usual gussied up suspects, and besides, holiday foo-foo is already in abundance. We'd just need to find a few hearty vendors for a weekend, load up on beer and food, celebrate the solstice symbolism, and run the show at Lloyd's Landing, the outdoor area at Bank Street Brewhouse, which we're not using in cold weather, anyway.

Maybe next year, we need to begin to start using it. I might drink outside today anyway, just for the fun of it. In the meantime, Old 502 Winery understand the warm wine tradition.

Like potpourri that will get you drunk:’ Hot Old 502 wine for the holidays, by Kevin Gibson (Insider Louisville)

Hot wine? Yes, hot wine. And we’re not talking about trends, either — Old 502 Winery has a wine available for a limited time that is designed to be served hot.

Everything in its right place.

"I feel at home, like I'm with a bunch of hippies." - Steve Price, bass and vocals for Youngstown Parade, New Albany Indiefest 2013, Lloyd's Landing at NABC's Bank Street Brewhouse

Art Walk "During and After" Party is at Bank Street Brewhouse this Saturday, June 22.

(NABC's event on the 22nd is not affiliated with the Carnegie Center or the sponsors of the Bicentennial Public Art Project)

It is unsure when we'll truly complete Lloyd's Landing, Bank Street Brewhouse's outdoor beer garden named in memory of the late Lloyd "Highwayman" Wimp, but we're using it to have as much fun as possible as we chip away at the build-out.

On Saturday, June 22, the New Albany Bicentennial Public Art Project stages its annual Public Art Walk through downtown. Beginning in mid-afternoon, we'll be partying along with the walkers. There'll be NABC beer, including a keg of the much acclaimed Tricentennial Ale; music by Ben Traughber, Taylor Lee and Tunder Wrane; and outdoor grilling by Chef Matt Weirich's kitchen ... complete with requisite temporary food permit by Floyd County's ever diligent Health Department.

For this occasion, we'll be pouring wines from the Old 502 Winery in Louisville, which is owned by the same family as JR's Pub in New Albany. Quills will be on hand to prepare cold coffee drinks and pour overs.

If it rains, the Art Walk will be rescheduled for June 29. We'll still have beer and music, so ...

New Albany Public Art Walk - Saturday, June 22, 6 - 9 p.m.

Join us for the official celebration for the 2013 New Albany Public Art Project: Bicentennial Series, with a Public Art Walk featuring the project artists, on Saturday June 22, 2013 from 6:00-9:00 pm (rain date June 29). The entire event is free and open to all ages!

Indie craft consciousness downtown on Saturday, September 22.

NABC’s contribution to the festivities of Louisville Craft Beer Week surely will strike some observers as atypical.

That’s because “typical” in craft beer is in desperate need of redefinition, and tilting at windmills like these is what gets me out of bed in the morning.

On Saturday, September 22, we’ll be breaking in Bank Street Brewhouse’s recently approved, (yet far from completed) former patio, called the WCTU Reading Room, and our new “biergarten,” known as Lloyd’s Landing. We’ll be pouring local and regional beers, ciders, meads and even some wines. We’ll be acting as the de facto adult beverage annex to the first-ever New Albany Indie Fest, and just for the fun of it, hosting a Kentucky bourbon tasting and dinner.

I’m calling it the Southern Indiana Craft Beer Showcase, but I might have simplified matters by omitting the word “beer.” It’s the main component, but not the only one. My ideological motivation is two-fold.

To make a point about what I view as overlapping circles of interest, from local to metro, from regional to national, and all the way to international.

To allow the people closest to me to experience tastes of what can be done by local producers and purveyors, not just of beer, but also of other libations that fuel my personal world.

I’ve always counseled event organizers to begin by tailoring their planned gatherings to those potential attendees closest in proximity, and only then widening the scope to entice those from a distance.

A good example is the renowned institution of the Beer Dinner. It has been my experience that the marvels of the “visiting” beer team alone generally will not sell the required number of seats. Rather, the regulars who already enjoy a chef’s menu and regimen invariably compose the biggest bloc of diners, and if they have a particular interest in the brewery or beers being paired, it serves to enhance a spark previously lit.

In like fashion, I want our Showcase event to be about this extended community, and to help explain the aspects of “buying local” that I personally believe are the most important: Shifting one’s personal discretionary spending from multinational to local, and while doing so, visualizing the way these circles touch.

Aeppeltroew ciders are made in Wisconsin, not Indiana. However, Starlight Distributors (owned by old friends) is located just up the Knobs from here. Indiana cideries and meaderies, like New Day, use local apples and honey whenever practicable. Regional winemakers buy grapes and juice from other places, but increasingly source their grapes from local and regional vineyards. Admittedly, barley isn’t grown hereabouts, although it could be. Someday, it might, especially after we conquer the next five percent.

And I want you to know that when you’re in Aurora, Bedford, Bloomington, Columbus or Nashville, there are breweries waiting to serve you (if you’re 21, of course) … that cider can be dry, and craft meads can be as variously costumed as craft beers … and that today’s Indiana wineries don’t restrict themselves to the sadly apocryphal sweet Manischewitz clones.

On Saturday, in addition to what I’m describing here, there’ll be booths, food, children’s activities and music out on Bank Street, courtesy of New Albany First and its Indie Fest.

There’ll also be all of downtown New Albany for roaming, and I wish you would roam it, because even though downtown always will be a work on progress and much remains to be done, more work’s already been done during the past five years than the quarter-century before – and this work has been undertaken almost exclusively by independent, small, local businesses.

These businesses are the real showcase on September 22. I’m choosing beer, cider, mead and wine to make my point about me, my business, and all the other indies. You can choose another platform, but the most important thing is the simplest: Make a choice.

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Now, back to Louisville Craft Beer Week. The third edition begins this Friday, September 21, and runs through the 29th. At last count, more than 61 events had been registered, and there’ll be a special pull-out section detailing them to be found in Wednesday’s edition of LEO Weekly.

Online, my friends at LouisvilleBeer.com is your conduit for LCBW events. Here’s the description of LCBW, 2012.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is a distinctively local celebration that seeks to educate and to raise awareness of the American Craft Beer Revolution at the local level, to showcase the incredible variety, dynamism, and expanding market presence of Craft Beer in Louisville, and to promote independent local establishments.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is a collaborative local mission. American Craft Brewing has re-established old traditions and created entirely new ones, and is closely tied to emerging ‘buy local’ principles. Local Craft Brewers are partners in the economic sense, perpetuating success by making the pie larger, and keeping money in our community.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is economic development. Craft Beer’s demographic is increasingly dynamic, but traditional patterns remain unchanged: youthful, college educated, well-traveled and affluent. The Internet is filled with urban revitalization success stories with a brewery as part of the scene, beginning with Governor John Hickenlooper’s Wynkoop Brewery in Lo-Do (Denver) in the 1980’s.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is all of us – brewers, wholesalers, package retailers, pubs, bars, and restaurants – but most importantly, Louisville Craft Beer Week is you – craft beer lovers living, working and playing right here in our city. Your patronage and enthusiasm makes it happen for all of us, and we thank you.

When you’re out and about during Louisville Craft Beer Week, always drink responsibly and whatever you do, don’t drive drunk.

Who can tell me about picnic tables?

Capital Brewery's biergarten in Middleton, Wisconsin 

By now, many readers are aware that I’ve succeeded in legislating the Bank Street Brewhouse parking lot out of existence, and initiating a conversion into a rectangular space intended for human, not automotive, habitation.

We‘re calling it Lloyd’s Landing, in memory of Lloyd “Highwayman” Wimp, and it strikes me as important to concede from the outset our clear-eyed recognition that resources are lacking to transform overnight an expanse of fenced asphalt into the sort of patio/beer garden all of us would like to see. I had to start somewhere, and the first hurdle is cleared. Now we embark on a long, meandering pathway to completion, which after all is a longstanding NABC tradition.

The asphalt needs removing and a new surface (or surfaces) put down. Landscaping and abundant greenery must be planned, and already we’ve had a generous offer of assistance in that area. In the sense of daily operations, there is a ripple effect of having Lloyd’s Landing open and usable. It is an extension of the WCTU Reading Room, and so the Reading Room must be completed, as well as beer taps installed in the new, second bar area. There must be employees, procedures, scheduling, sweeping, signage – and can someone buy another case of cups?

However, in order to do so much as bluff our way through this at the barest of minimums, perhaps the second most important factor after the licensing itself is to have somewhere in Lloyd’s Landing for customers to sit.

Two things that all patios have in common are tables and chairs, and when it comes to areas designed for outdoor beer drinking, tables and chairs often merge into the unit we’ve come to know as the picnic table. In a Bavarian beer garden, these usually come detached, with benches not physically connected to the table. They’re certainly an option, and while pricey, can be purchased used in Louisville. The Hofbrauhaus in Newport, Kentucky, deploys them to marvelous effect.

Note that if we could afford a first-class buildout like the Hofbrahaus's exemplary Bavarian-style beer garden, I'd likely be living in Munich already.

Thinking outside "classic" boxes, non-traditional materials might conceivably be used, as with hints provided by these benches built from wooden pallets.

However, in an era of enlarged beer drinkers much like myself, I have recurring worries about durability.

Readers, what do you know about sources and pricing for standard, one-piece picnic tables in the American sense? I can be reached through the usual channels, such as roger(at)newalbanian(dot)com, and I’d appreciate whatever feedback you have to offer.

ATC gives BSB a thumbs up, and the Publican is happy.

Earlier today, Bank Street Brewhouse was given the Indiana Alcohol & Tobacco Commission's approval for floor plan changes, and now the WCTU Reading Room and Lloyd's Landing are legal habitats, respectively, for pouring and drinking Progressive Pints. Quite a bit remains to be done, but this first cleared hurdle is a relief.

As explained previously, the translucent panels above the WCTU Reading Room simply had to be replaced -- and work began this morning on a new, insulated roof. From inception, the space has not been watertight, and while this mattered little when it still served as open-air patio, converting it into a multi-purpose, all-weather room could not be achieved without a better roof.

Many thanks to Steve Resch and his merry band of workmen. There are none better in this city.

We await the ATC's verdict.

The first steps toward improvements at Bank Street Brewhouse have been taken, and now we'll see what the Alcohol & Tobacco Commission thinks. The build-out for Lloyd's Landing and refurbishments in the WCTU Reading Room will take some time to finish, but the most important initial "to do" items have commenced. Stay tuned, because I'll be hitting you up for furniture suggestions very, very soon.

Bank Street Brewhouse's former patio will be rechristened as the WCTU Reading Room.

Construction on Lloyd's Landing at Bank Street Brewhouse begins this week. Here are the plans and details.

Lloyd's Landing progress continues.

The hedge had become infested with weeds, and the tree was half-dead. We needed a clean retaining wall for fencing. I hate killing vegetation, but we'll have a landscaping program in place by next spring, by which time perhaps there'll be some rain. The Lloyd's Landing buildout will continue in fits and starts, with the ultimate objective of facilitating the enjoyment of locally brewed craft beer in the great outdoors. Your patience, patronage and support are appreciated.

Construction on Lloyd's Landing at Bank Street Brewhouse begins this week. Here are the plans and details.

From the inception of NABC’s Bank Street Brewhouse in 2009, it has been our ultimate aim to annex the remainder of the parking area on the building’s north side, and to build an outdoor garden for use in seasonable weather -- although I realize “seasonable” is somewhat the subjective term these days.

I’m happy to announce that finally, the time has come to begin this project. On Thursday (August 23), work will commence with the construction of walls and fences to delineate the rectangular outdoor space, thus complying with state alcoholic beverage regulations governing its future use by craft beer drinkers.

This all-ages outdoor space will be called Lloyd’s Landing, in honor of our cherished friend, the late Lloyd “Highwayman” Wimp.

It is my belief that we can have Alcohol and Tobacco Commission approval for this new “patio” (legally, it will be referred to as a “patio,” not a “beer garden” as such, although this is a mere technicality) in our hands by the first week of September.

This means a few changes, clarifications and explanations.

(1) From the time that construction starts this Thursday, vehicular access to the parking area will cease. According to ATC regulations, there can be no back-and-forth in the ground’s daily usage. Once the parking area has been licensed by the ATC for people and their beers, it no longer can be used to park their cars.

(2) Parking alternatives are many. There is unmetered parking on Bank Street itself. The parking lot across Bank Street once again is open, and the lot adjacent to the Carnegie Center, while signposted for Carnegie use, can be used in daytime. The Fox Law parking lot on the south side of Bank Street Brewhouse can be used after 5:00 p.m., and so can the Schad Law parking spaces, just east of the Carnegie Center and visible from Bank Street Brewhouse. For those interested in centrally located parking to facilitate roaming throughout historic downtown New Albany, please be aware that the city’s parking garage on the corner of State and Market Streets is free on weeknights (after 5:00 p.m.) and on weekends. This is three blocks from Bank Street Brewhouse to the southwest.

(3) The former roofed patio, which was modified earlier this year by the installation of garage doors facing north, now will be considered part of the original building’s extended floor plan, thus enabling us to build out and use the rear bar area. This former patio space will be referred to as the WCTU Reading Room, for reasons to be explained elsewhere.

(3) The officially designated smoking area will be the entirety of the Lloyd’s Landing outdoor garden expanse, as accessed through the door to the left and rear of the WCTU Reading Room. Because the WCTU Reading Room is a building and not a patio, state law forbids smoking inside it.

(4) Our newly evolving public areas have specific purposes. Lloyd’s Landing is intended as an outdoor area for the enjoyment of beers, entertainment and special events (weather permitting). When fully weatherized, the WCTU Reading Room is intended as a year-round casual use area for beers. Weather permitting, it will be a garage-doors-up, natural extension of Lloyd’s Landing. It also will be capable of adaptation for special events, tastings and gatherings (like the Prost room at NABC’s original location). Because Bank Street Brewhouse’s kitchen is small, food service will remain a feature of the BSB main dining room, bar and current street-side Taxpayers Memorial Patio. Eventually, you’ll be able to enjoy a pleasant drink outside, and then be seated when a dining area table is ready.

(5) These first steps (fencing and licensing) are only the beginning. They will be followed by much more work: Lloyd’s Landing surfacing, furnishings and landscaping; WCTU Reading Room roof, furnishings and bar completion; and the step-by-step process of coordinating them all. We will complete these steps as time and money permit.

Thanks for your patience as we begin the build-out. Your suggestions and questions are welcomed.