Pigtown’s Suspended Brewing Co. is planning a move to North Baltimore.
The start of the new year will also be the start of a new chapter for the nearly 7-year-old craft brewery, according to an announcement on Suspended’s Facebook page.
“In 2017, we poured our first pint on New Year’s Eve,” the message, posted on Tuesday evening, says. “This New Year’s Eve we will pour our last pint at 912 Washington Blvd.”
The post did not specify where the brewery will be moving to in North Baltimore, nor did it specify a timeline. Suspended Brewing founder Yasmin Karimian was not immediately available for comment.
Karimian and Suspended co-founder Josey Schwartz had previously looked into moving the brewery to 629 W. 36th St. in Hampden, but backed out of those plans this spring after encountering pushback from neighbors concerned about traffic congestion and parking.
Wherever it is, Suspended Brewing’s new address will take up a smaller footprint. The brewery “barely made it through the pandemic” and has “struggled to find steady footing ever since,” the post said, adding that “having such a large taproom has presented its own challenges.”
“We’ve found a small, cozy building in North Baltimore that will become our brewery’s new home,” the announcement continues. “The move is more than an address change: it’s an opportunity to reinvent ourselves.”
Karimian and Schwartz, who started out as home-brewers, handled much of the build-out for the industrial-style Pigtown brewery themselves. They envisioned the taproom as a place for people to connect: Suspended Brewing takes its name from an Italian pay-it-forward tradition in which a customer buys a cup of coffee for themselves and another for someone in need.
When it opened, Suspended was the only brewery in Pigtown. Now, the neighborhood is also home to Wico Street Beer Co. and Pickett Brewing Co.
Kim Lane, the executive director of Pigtown Main Street, said Suspended Brewing was instrumental in spurring more private development in the Southwest Baltimore neighborhood.
“They really put that area, that block, on fire,” Lane said. “When they rehabbed that property and opened it, they set an expectation of what this neighborhood deserves, in terms of types of businesses and how they look, inside and outside. They set a high bar, and we’re really appreciative of that.”
She said two businesses have already reached out to express interest in leasing the Suspended Brewing space.
Suspended Brewing will continue its normal taproom hours through Dec. 30 and will host a farewell party on New Year’s Eve, according to the Facebook post.