Interview at the GABF: Lynne Weaver and Alexandra Nowell of ThreeWeavers Brewing Co

The Three Weavers Brewing Co is quite unique in the brewing industry, for one a woman, Lynne Weaver, owns it and second, the head brewer is also a woman, Alexandra Nowell. They were at the Great American Brew Fest representing their brewery.  

Lynne Weaver and Alexandra Nowell.

I caught up with them while it was still calm at the fest. Lynne Weaver is a friendly and articulate person who spoke candidly about the GABF and of being in the brewing industry. She started to home-brew after staying home raising her kids. Lynne likes to bake and home brewing wasn't that much different to her. Her first beer she brewed was very much like the Expatriate Ale that they were pouring at the GABF. The brewery was funded with Kickstarter.

I asked her, "How do you go from homebrewer to brewery owner?" She replied "being of my background in finance, I wanted to find out if it was a viable business so I went to the CBC in DC and found out if was a viable business and Los Angeles area sorely in need of breweries."  After five months Lynne then stepped down from brewing realizing that her skills were more useful in the business side then the brewing side. It was a hard transition for her but ultimately started looking for a brew master and Alexandra Nowell name came up.  I asked her if it was difficult being a woman in the industry and she said that Alexandra caught most of the hits since she is the brewer. Lynne thought it was more difficult getting respect as a woman home brewer than a woman owning a brewery.  

I then talked with Alexandra Nowell, she has a great credential in the industry, She was exposed to brewing in an academic career and studying for nine to 10 months evaluated it as a career. The first beer they both got them in craft beer was Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. Alexandra has been brewing for 5 and half years. She got her start as a paid intern as Sierra Nevada after the internship she was employed at Moylan's Brewery and then in 2010 got a brewing job at Drake's Brewing where her job was in their barrel-aging program.  Alexandra thought the GABF was a great place on the brewer's perspective to taste peoples beers that we don't have access to and also on the consumers side they have access to beers they're not. And gives their brewery more exposure to other markets which is always nice when you're trying to grow a new brewery. Lynne thought the GABF was a lot of fun and tiring, this was her first time here.

Lynne Weave then proceeded to pour me a taste one of their beers, Midnight Flight, a stout, which I found, had a nice maltiness and richness to it. I liked it.

These two women are an inspiration in the dedication to push the boundaries to fulfill their dreams.

So if you're in the LA area, stop by and have a taste of their beers.