Alamo Beer Brewery

Alamo Beer Brewery takes an underserved, underutilized part of downtown San Antonio and transforms it into a new hub for both the Eastside and greater city. The three-building complex is crafted from economical pre-engineered metal systems and organized around a central gathering space that brings together brewery operations, administrative offices, and the beer hall itself.

The building does more with less, with recycled and reclaimed material prevalent throughout. The pre-engineered steel structure, a common industrial and agrarian warehouse system, is adapted to the brewery and pushed to the exterior, leaving the interior spaces column-free. This strategy creates flexibility and adaptability for future changes.

The Brewery’s beer garden has become one of the great community spaces in San Antonio. By being outdoors, it consumes essentially no resources, while providing both great flexibility for use and connection to downtown. 75% of the building volume is naturally ventilated and 70% of the public areas are located outside, creating a setting that consumes little resources while providing an iconic, outdoor space in San Antonio.

Designed for high performance, the Brewery’s production facility is the largest structure operating without air conditioning. The building tempers the interior space with barn door openings, intake louvers, exhaust fans, and operable windows, reducing energy consumption dramatically with an overall project energy use intensity (EUI) that is 77.4% lower than similar building types. The Brewery also has a 64 kW PV array which reduces heat transfer into the building and provides approximately 23% of the operation’s power.

Reclaimed Materials

Custom elements include large perforated, corrugated panels. Steel reclaimed from a nearby historic manufacturing facility was used to fabricate the Brewery’s iconic big barn doors. Appearing as an extension of the nearby Hays Street Bridge, the Brewery’s red rust-colored façade is consistent with the surrounding industrial buildings in the warehouse district. The skin is long-lasting Corten Steel that requires no coating and lasts for decades.