Tag Archives: distilleries

Oola Distillery saying goodbye to 2020 and Capitol Hill with move to Georgetown

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Kallas-Lewis on Oola’s five-year anniversary

14th and Union has been home to a lively slice of Capitol Hill with a “Southern” dive bar, a gay bar, and the neighborhood’s sole remaining craft distillery. All of that will be gone when things get back closer to normal after the heights of the COVID-19 crisis — Oola Distillery is joining the rest in exiting the corner.

Nine years after it poured its first tastes of small batch vodka and gin, owners Kirby Kallas-Lewis and KT Niehoff announced the distillery and its 10 Degrees event space are leaving Capitol Hill for Georgetown.

“We are sad to leave the Hill,” Kallas-Lewis said. “KT and I have been a devoted part of the neighborhood for almost 25 years. Covid related challenges created a sooner than expected departure, but we are staying positive and looking forward to joining the Georgetown community.” Continue reading →

Sun Liquor moving distillery off Capitol Hill

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Capitol Hill’s craft distillery industry is being downed by half and one of the neighborhood’s longest running purveyors of craft cocktails is contemplating more changes on E Pike.

CHS has learned that Sun Liquor Distillery, one of two craft-level spirit makers operating in Pike/Pine’s light-manufacturing zone left behind by the neighborhood’s auto row legacy, is moving operations to a nondescript warehouse on the backstreets behind University Village.

“We need two times as much space and the loading on E Pike is just too dangerous,” Sun’s founder Michael Klebeck tells CHS. Klebeck said his company is also considering working with a new owner to take over the Sun Liquor lounge across the street from the bottling facility on E Pike. Continue reading →