De Wilde Brouwers

De Wilde Brouwers is a young Belgian brewery rooted in Flora, Merelbeke, on the edge of Ghent. Its identity combines traditional Belgian fermentation with a distinctly contemporary, ecological outlook: organic and circular ingredients, recovered rainwater and solar energy. The brewery also gives new life to equipment from vanished breweries, creating beers that connect local industrial history with experimental brewing practice. A brewery in a former slipper factory The brewery occupies a post-war industrial site where SOFACQ slippers were made until the late 1970s. Rather than treating the building as a blank modern production space, De Wilde Brouwers presents it as part of the brewery’s heritage, alongside an art collection and vegan bakery. The address is Hundelgemsesteenweg 310 in Merelbeke, in the Ghent area. Belgian tradition, broad fermentation range De Wilde Brouwers works with low, high and wild fermentation. Its beers are described as unfiltered and bottle-refermented, while some specialty beers are aged in wooden barrels and blended with freshly brewed beer. The brewery also produces organic beers and offers existing beers with customized labels, so its portfolio includes both house recipes and occasion or private-label work. Planet-first brewing The brewery’s current approach is built around reducing resource use: it says it brews with organic and secondary raw materials, purified recovered rainwater and solar energy, with the goal of operating off grid. That environmental program sits alongside a recognizably Belgian brewing vocabulary rather than replacing it. A Merelbeke brewery where Belgian fermentation traditions meet reclaimed equipment and planet-first brewing. Flora, Merelbeke, Belgium 2017-01-13 2017: De Wilde Brouwers was established on 13 January as a Belgian beer-manufacturing enterprise.