Dress Made From Beer

I've heard rumors of beer being used to get someone out of a dress, but now someone is making dresses out of beer.

The Beer Dress is made from fabric produced by a bacterial-fermentation process. Scientist Gary Cass and visual artist Donna Franklin previously collaborated on a fermented-wine dress in 2012. That dress had a distinctive look to it, like it was made from Fruit Roll-Ups. The wine dress looked strange, slightly alien. The Beer Dress looks more like what we recognize as typical fabric, despite its unusual origin. You wouldn't know where it came from if someone didn't tell you.

Well, it sort of resembles a frothy head of beer too.

I Need New Socks

Saw these over at the Guns & Coffee blog.

Thanks to Fred for the photo. Be sure to visit his blog for more news on our two favorite brewed beverages.

OCCUPY! Your Local Brewery

During my recent visit to Blue & Gray Brewery, I picked up a new brewery t-shirt, one that's quite apropos to current events. Jeff from the brewery described the new shirts in an email:

You may have heard the brabble generated by the Occupy Wall Street protestors.  Now that local governments have begun to shoo the protesters back to their parents basement apartment we at the Blue & Gray Brewing Co. are getting very concerned:

We believe someone should make an honest profit from these anti-capitalism efforts before the fervor dies down.  We think it should be by us.  Therefore, we have contracted to exploit American workers to produce OCCUPY! Your Local Brewery T-shirts available in time for Christmas.

I reserved my shirt as soon as I received the email and will wear it proudly. The shirts were offered to brewery email subscribers initially and will be available to the public on December 22. Stop by the brewery to get yours.

Beer T-Shirts

Recently the "Serious Eats" blog ran a feature entitled "Restaurant Shirts Are the New Concert Tee". The author opines that "restaurant shirts have replaced the concert tee". I don't own any restaurant tees per se, however my thoughts went right to my own collection of brewpub and brewery tees. It doesn't happen at every stop, but I do like to pick up a shirt when I visit a new brewery. I prefer beer shirts that are from specific breweries, rather than generic tees that simply have some witty (or not) saying about beer.

The shirts tend to elicit comments and some serve as great conversation starters about craft beer. I frequently can be seen in my "Get Hazed" shirt for Hazed & Infused Pale Ale from Boulder Brewing. Although, I'm not so sure the reader's first thought is of beer when I wear that one. I wore a "Great Minds Drink Alike" shirt from Great Divide Brewery to the World Beer Fest in Raleigh last Spring, and was actually stopped by someone who wanted take a picture of the shirt. (I'm pretty sure it was the shirt she was interested in, not the physique behind it.)

My most recent acquisition is a shirt from Outer Banks Brewing. The tee bears the slogan "Beers With Character, Characters With Beer". Catchy. And now that we're getting close to cooler weather, it's time to dig out my "hoodie" from Blue & Gray Brewery. That sweatshirt initiates many opportunities to tell folks about Fredericksburg's local craft brewery.

There are any number of beer-related tees bearing that oft-repeated quote attributed to Benjamin Franklin, "Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." We know that the quote is little more than legend, but it's a fun thought none-the-less. Recently, Elevator Brewery and Draught Haus decided to recall shirts they sold with that quote incorrectly attributed to good ole Ben. That's an interesting gesture on the part of the brewery, though it might just serve to turn the non-returned shirts into collector's items.

A shirt from Weeping Radish Brewery has the following prayer:
He Who Drinks Beer Sleeps Well,
He Who Sleeps Well Cannot Sin,
He Who Cannot Sin Goes to Heaven.
Amen

The prayer is attributed to a "16th Century Monk". Do I believe that? Not at all. I've also seen a variation referenced as an "Irish Proverb". That doesn't make the shirt any less fun to wear and talk about though.

What are some of your favorite brewery tees?