Wren House Brewing Co.

I visited this, the original Wren House location, on my first day in Phoenix and I loved it! The only place that exceeded my experience was … another Wren House location.
This place had all the feel of a friendly, familiar brewpub, only serving up some of the best beer in the state (and beyond). Definitely a must-stop.

Day 6 out west on beer & baseball with the unusual suspects. The traveling roadshow has now hit Phoenix. Stayed out playing late last night which saw this morning, flew in from San Diego, in & out, brewery, and now another brewery to end the day. We’ve got one more in us, right? Always. And onward. Small unassuming place on the side of the road that Ben blew right past…

Cool little joint. Wait. This is an old residential home. In and through to the rear. ‘L’ shaped wood plank topped bar & white subway tile base. Seating for 10 on black squared stools, split for center service; 6 off the corner & 4 on the end of the stretch. 4x6 horizontal letter board on white subway tile barback wall center. 20 draft beers listed in 2 rows of 10 (beer, style, ABV) + 4 bottle & can pours. Shelving inlay with glassware, merch, & crowlers to the left, and a can cooler to the right corner.

Arched black canvas ceiling over the bar with drop marshmallow lamps tracing and then thin slat wood ceiling on white rafters throughout the rest of the room. Mostly slat wood floors with some block tiled areas. The walls done in 2-tone eggshell over white slat sections with a 48-star flag on the far wall, small framed can label prints above the bar & front side overhangs, and can displays above the front windows. Okto flaggings, a corner potted plant, a front window neon, and a framed 1912 Arizona map in the front corner.

Off the bar, it’s a somewhat openish space with a single large shared table in the center of the room fronting an old white stucco plastered fireplace in the middle of the room, with a mounted animal head, sprawling viney things, small mounted filament bulb lamps, and potted plants on its mantle. A single 2-seat table alongside the fireplace and a small bar counter spur to the rear below a can label pasted walls, and a few framed prints in a row along the topside displaying medals. An old classroom pull-down Arizona map in the little hallway off of there. Up front, a pair of hightops and a slight bar counter spur in the front windows. (Don’t touch the) potted cacti on the sills. cluster filament softball lighting over the big table and sunken spots over the forward seating.

2 kegerators behind the bar, each with a pair of 5 logo tap handled ‘T’ towers atop. All 20 taps are up at present. 12 of them are hoppys; 9 of which have the word ‘hazy’ in their descriptions. And I drank damn near everything else (Marzen, 6.1%, clean, a bit of sweetness, good body, well done; Prasna Brena, Czech Pale Lager, 4%, a little spicy, delightful; Prairie Ghost, Altbier, 5%, toffee, chocolate, a reeeeeal nice brown ale; Big Spill, DH Pilsner with Nelson, 4.8%, goddamn, like Nelson, man; Valley Beer, Lager, 4.6%, clean, crisp, bready, slightly floral, yes, they can Lager; Lady Banks, Gose, 4%, wow, it’s red, Fred. Hibiscus, chamomile, & rose petals, tart, lovely, really; Festbier, German Lager, 5.2%, clean, light hop, malty beautifulness; Fresh Hop Wrenovation, WC IPA, 7%, citrus, bitter, yum, quite nice). Prairie Ghost Altbier for the win. And the Festbier, Lady Banks Gose, Big Spill DH Pilsner, & Prasna Brena Czech Pale Ale all jammed, too.

On walkabout now; back to the front reception area, there’s a single hightop roundie table, and a potted plants lending sprawling vininess around the side room entrance. And step to the small side room; a pair of low roundies, another can label pasted wall, framed logo house beer prints, & cluster drop bulbs. And to the patio now, the backyard space holds 3 picnic tables, 3 hexagon tables, and some Adirondack chairs there (me, pointing). And the mister spritzer, because there’s nighttime hotness happening.

We toyed with popping a bottle of barleywine but no, it’s been too damn long a day. And you’d think “Well that would be the perfect time for a barleywine”, and you’d be right, just not tonight. Matthewtender today. Knows his game. Shared his wares. It’s a good range selection even with more than half of them being hoppys, and I had some great beers here. Chill house, literally. This place fucking rocks. Recommended!

Small, big selection awesome bartender. What else you need?

 

Somewhat a skudgy part of town.
Rundown inside.
No evidence of food, but awedome beer place.
Bar keeper (brewer?) was very attentive and helgul.
Wide selection of some very serious beers.

2024-03-16
Visited on the Saturday before St Patrick's Day, after dinner, with wife and two kids. Busy, almost packed. Ordered pizza from Lou Malnati's to deliver there. Staff was friendly and knowledgeable about their beer, crowd was friendly and laid back, kids loved the bar cat. All the beer we tried was very good. IPA and lager heavy menu.

This is literally in a house, go figure. Smaller than expected given the quality of their work, so be aware in busier hours. Heavy metal plays in the background as locals argue about which dinosaur is coolest before the bartender chimes in with a pint and brachiosaurus. (Totally stegosaurus btw) Neighborhood vibe for sure. Beer selection is varied and has an even large range of ingredients. Found a quieter corner in a room off to the side to enjoy some well balanced brews

 

My wife and I visited Wren House earlier this week while in Phoenix. I would say that this was the most highly-recommended brewery of this trip.

10 beers were available upon our visit. They are heavy on the IPAs: session, standard, hazy and double. Six of the ten taps were IPAs plus a dry hopped pilsner. I had the Spellbinder IPA (the 2020 GABF gold-winning hazy), Tylda IPA, Big Spill Pils with Nelson dry hops, and the Valley Beer lager which was crisp and tasty. Everything I had was excellent.

The taproom is small and clean with a white tile look. We sat up at the bar and service was great; friendly, cool and helpful. Wren House is a bit hop-forward and out-of-the-way geographically, but absolutely worth a stop if you're in Phoenix. Outstanding!

 

Somewhat of a dive bar, but the beer is pretty good. Bit of a seedy area, with someone harassing us and other customers inside and outside. Some of the better beer worth it all.

On a recent trip to Arizona, I paid a visit to Wren House. Several friends had recommended it. They sure were right! It's a small, cozy brewery located on the North Side of Phoenix. They had a nice variety of beers on tap and to go. Friendly, knowledgeable staff offered suggestions and samples. A must stop if you are in the area.

Cool spot. Fairly small, but it is in a remodeled house, after all. Good service, lots of different varieties of beer- IPAs, lagers, stouts- maybe no sours, but there is also a good bit of barrel aged beers available on tap and out of the can. It's a cool spot, though parking is a bit limited- vibrant and busy place, but well lit with plenty of nice people to talk to.

 

Cool place. Great vibe. Highly mediocre beer, which was disappointing given the very positive word.

 

 

 

Small tasting room with bar that seat maybe 10. Seven of their beers and one guest tap. The 1 I had was excellent. Unfortunately they are such a small brewery they only fill growlers of one of their beers and the guest tap. This was very disappointing. They sell 4pk, but not singles nor mixed packs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Small, house-like vibe in this space akin to a modest and quaint coffee shop. Open ceilings help give this small space a little more room. The bar is short and seats maybe a dozen or so customers with a handful of various sized tables. Tap list is short, but sweet. They had 9 tap handles, but just less than that on tap - all their own beer. The selection was focused (almost 50%) on IPAs on my late May visit (bartender said "it's hazy season" as a joke to another patron). Aside from the IPA focus, they did have a hefe and a few other odd-balls for a small brewery, which shows promise. Crowlers are available, but only about half the tap list was allowed to be put in crowlers. They do can releases, but otherwise the only way to take home beer is via crowlers. Staff was friendly and inviting and while the place was packed, helped suggest some beers and other local places to visit. Location felt a little odd as an out-of-towner. The little shop comes up quick with only a few off-street parking spots, so either be ready for a hard turn (if driving north) or just pull off onto the next side street. Worth the visit.

 

 

Cool little spot with a couple different sections, some games, and a nice bar layout. Solid offerings and friendly staff. A BA Imperial Stout and not one but two Triple IPAs will keep the big beer crowd happy. A Kolsch and hoppy Pils keep the small beer crowd happy. Neighborhood looks to be improving. Outside building appearance could use some work but otherwise I’m glad we stopped by.

Wren House makes amazing beer across the board - bold brews like a jasmine green tea saison, huge triple IPAs, pastry stouts, sours, whatever - the variety on hand is such that there's always something to your taste.

That said, going to Wren House was the first time I ever felt unwelcome in a brewery/taproom. The three guys & one gal there were unapproachable and cold, reluctant to talk about their or other local beer, upcoming festivals, their favorite beers on tap, etc. Bummer.

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One of the owners reached out to me about the above review and I've since upgraded both the service from a 2 to a 4 and Vibe from a 2 to a 3. Really nice to see a commitment to hospitality from the top down. I may have had an uncommon & unfortunate experience at Wren and still highly recommend going as the beer was amazing.

Colony Collapse release day, fun crowd. The (cask) mango version of Colony Collapse was pretty damn tasty, having said that, this place is small and cozy and probably needs to expand. I hope they do and I hope Wren House can keep the pub feel when they do. Lol, they'll have to rename the bigger place, the name (wren) won't fly.

 

 

 

Located next to a liquor store, this is a small little tasting room with a 10 seat wood top bar. Walls are painted off-white over the bricks. Some table fill the space. Blackboard lists the offerings. There were 9 on draft during my visit, and the two beers I had were of very high quality and quite tasty. Definite local vibe in the room as most people seemed to know each other. Defintely worthy of a visit if you are on this side of town.

 

One of the top 5 in Phoenix. Spellbinder, Spellbinder, Spellbinder!

Wren House is my Monday go to spot. I'd give all 5, but they do not serve food (they do not mind of your bring food though), they rotate pretty often there has been a new beer on tap every week I've gone but if you're not a fan of their beer go somewhere else. Not sure who wouldn't be a fan. They are IPA specialists and sours if you can catch that on tap. They sell out of their canned beer pretty quick, watch for their limited releases on FB because they make bomb dessert beers. Staff is very knowledgeable and friendly. Kind of gets a hipster crowd at times, especially Tuesday trivia nights depending on the trivia theme.