Includes information for Soul Rebel Brew Co and Hale Brewing.
Brewery
2C Uplands Business Park E17 5QJ (Waltham Forest)
twitter.com/exalebrewing
First sold beer: 12 December 2019 (as Exale Brewing)
Hale Brewing (Five Miles)
Brewpub no longer brewing
39B Markfield Road N15 4QA (Haringey)
First sold beer: December 2016 (as Affinity), March 2018 (as Hale)
Ceased brewing: August 2019
Brewer Daniel Vane worked for London Brewing and Weird Beard before cuckoo brewing in his own right from 2014 under the name Soul Rebel, collaborating with various breweries across the UK. When Affinity Brew Co expanded from its original home in a collection of half-sized shipping containers in the yard of post-industrial Tottenham bar and venue Five Miles late in 2017, the bar’s co-founder Mark Hislop (ex-Brewdog and Redchurch) got together with Daniel to create a successor. The result was Hale Brewing, which took over the little 5 hl kit Affinity left behind, originally bought from Anspach & Hobday.
In 2019, the brewery began implementing plans to expand to a new site with taproom close to several other relocated breweries in Blackhorse Road, Walthamstow, shared with its neighbour at Five Miles, the Victory London Distillery. For complex business reasons, this involved winding up the old company and creating a new one under the present multiply punning name.
Exale, now boasting a 20 hl Elite Stainless brewhouse, also provides apprenticeships and takes care to reduce its environmental impact including turning waste beer into vinegar and soap. Beerblefish moved next door in 2021. Daniel moved on in 2020, with Mark and business partner Andy Solley running the business.
The old container-based kit is now on its fourth owner, Muswell Hillbilly, and has been moved from Five Miles, which has since closed.
In March 2023, the brewery added its first off-site pub, the Three Colts Tavern in Bethnal Green E2, on the site of a historic pub of that name. In January 2024, Mark stepped down with Andy now leading the business. At the same time, the brewery announced that to ensure sustainability it would focus on making beer only for its taproom, pub and a third planned retail site, rather than for third party sales.
Beers, many of them unusually flavoured, are mainly kegged as well as canned using a mobile line, with some in cask and bottle.
Updated 26 January 2024.
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