Capital Brewing Co and Bentspoke Brewing shared the honours at the annual Australian Hotels Association (ACT) Hospitality and Tourism Awards on Monday night, being named Best Beer Venue. Capital was also namedBest New Venue.

It was a significant debut appearance for the Capital brewery and tap room.

“We’re thrilled to have taken out not one, but two prestigious awards,” Capital Brewing’s Managing Director Laurence Kain said.

“It’s fitting recognition for the efforts of our entire team, from the brewers making world class beer, to our front-of-house team creating a world class beer experience for our patrons.”

Built in a disused warehouse in the Molonglo Group’s new wetlands foreshore development, Capital Brewing now boasts 12 craft beer taps, a fully-refurbished beer garden and outdoor stage and glass-walled fireplace and indoor courtyard, that all back onto an immense production facility.

The venue was opened by ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr on September 9 last year.

Richard Watkins, owner and Head Brewer at BentSpoke Brewing, was pleased to add yet more awards to the trophy cabinet.

“BentSpoke Brewing Co is ecstatic to share Best Beer Venue with another local brewery Capital Brewing Co.,” he said.

“This is a fantastic result for the local beer community and just proves that the ACT punches well above its weight when it comes to beer. At BentSpoke we are proud to be acknowledged in this way and a real pat on the back to all the staff working at BentSpoke.

“We also want to congratulate Capital on the best new venue an award, an award BentSpoke also won in 2015,” Richard said.

Capital Brewing Laurence Kain said the award recognised thesuccess of the venue.

“It’s been wildly popular since day one,” Kain said.

“We knew we were creating something special, but we definitely underestimated just how much support we’d receive from our fantastic local community, to whom we are eternally grateful.”

The venue’s popularity has driven strong growth with production growing from 30,000 litres per month at openingto 110,000 litres per month now.

Annual production is forecast to hit 1 million litres with additional capacity due to be installed in September 2018.Further expansion is now on the cards, and the brewery will shortly take over half of an adjoining building to house a canning line and grain silo.