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Wynkoop Brewing Company
Wynkoop Brewing Company opened in 1988 in what was then a fairly rough, underdeveloped stretch of LoDo, founded by John Hickenlooper along with Russell Schehrer, Mark Schiffler, and Jerry Williams. Hickenlooper would go on to become Denver's mayor and later Colorado's governor, giving Wynkoop a genuinely unusual claim among American brewpubs: its founder ended up running the entire state. The brewpub was one of the first of its kind in Denver, combining a full restaurant with an in-house brewing operation at a time when that combination was still a novel format rather than the standard template it's since become across the country. A large billiards hall on the top floor added a social, hangout dimension beyond just food and beer, reinforcing the brewpub as a genuine gathering spot rather than a purely food-and-drink stop. Wynkoop has also built a specific piece of beer-world tradition around itself: the brewery sponsors the annual "Beerdrinker of the Year" competition, a genuinely odd and specific event that's become a small institution of its own within craft beer culture, run out of the same LoDo building the brewery has occupied since 1988. For a Denver breweries list, Wynkoop is the essential "the original brewpub, run by a future governor" entry — proof that Denver's now-massive craft beer identity has real roots in a single LoDo building that predates most of the neighborhood's current development.
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Our Mutual Friend Brewing
Our Mutual Friend Brewing has built its reputation in Denver's River North (RiNo) Art District around a genuinely specific commitment: lagers, at a moment when most American craft breweries were still chasing hop-forward IPAs and pastry-adjacent stouts as the format that got the most attention. That focus on a style category most craft drinkers associated with mass-market macro beer, rather than serious craft technique, was a deliberate contrarian bet. Lagers are, by most brewers' own admission, technically harder to make well than a heavily hopped ale — there's nowhere to hide a flaw behind aggressive bitterness or dark roasted malt, which means a clean, well-executed lager depends entirely on genuine technical precision. Building an entire brewery's identity around that harder format, rather than the more forgiving styles dominating the craft beer conversation, has given Our Mutual Friend a specific niche within Denver's crowded brewery scene. RiNo itself has become one of Denver's most concentrated brewery and taproom districts over the past decade, filled with ambitious, design-forward spaces, and Our Mutual Friend has held its own in that competitive stretch specifically by being genuinely different from the hop-forward taprooms surrounding it rather than trying to out-IPA the neighborhood. For a Denver breweries list, Our Mutual Friend is the essential "lagers done seriously" entry — proof that the hardest, least flashy beer style in the business can still be the thing that makes a Denver brewery stand out.
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