Ironclad Brewery

There is a reason this place is a ghost town. The beer is not bad, but nothing special. The service is not great. The bartenders upstairs have nothing to do and still act as though they are doing you a favor to get you a drink or explain the beer selection. I would also like to mention that I don’t want to go to a bar and be told if I were not to feel the «Bern» then I was not welcome and should leave. That is fine with me, your bar wont be around much longer anyway with how you treat customers. How also should mention the bar tender suggested that anyone who is not for Bernie Sanders should leave Wilmington as well. If you want to feel the Bern, want poor service and sit in a big empty room then this is the place for you. The nice thing about downtown Wilmington is there are plenty of choices.

All 4 of the beers I tried were terrible. I wish I had more to say, but as a brewery-​hopper and avid beer drinker, I couldn’t have been more disappointed.

What a great place with tons of space! The service was excellent and the servers were very nice and in what seemed to be a cheerful mood. Kinda helps that this was also a Unilocal event, not to mention it was my first! This brew house had a very large first deck with a small stage in case y’all want to get your Michael Jackson on, and second deck with bar and overlook to the stage area below! As if beer wasn’t amazing enough, the brewery actually created and named a beer The Unilocal ESB! A dry and definitive taste yet not too over powering for the lite beer drinker, and it went down real smooth. This place served great for a social get together. I came with high expectations and « Unilocal dun blowed ‘em outta da water.» This is why The Ironclad Brewery has gained the all time BOO-​YAH!!! For making my first Unilocal event one I will always remember!
BOO-​YAH!!!

Best way to start your day? Brewing beer!
Today I headed over to Ironclad with Kristen from Kids Making It to work with the brewing team to produce the Unilocal beer for our upcoming holiday party. It was a great opportunity to network and learn more about the brewing process. Ethan the headmaster is both welcoming and knowledge. His team, Lydia and Nash do a seamless job of crafting local brews. I am super excited to taste the finished product.
Honestly the reviews do not do this place justice. The venue is breathtaking and the staff are a pleasure to be around. Dogs are welcome on the bottom floor and this large event space has everything you would need for an event.

The space was really cool, and the brewers/​owners were so friendly and welcoming. The boyfriend and I shared a flight, and none of the selections were really outstanding. We ended up getting pints of the guest tap selections.

So on the brewery tour my sister and I did through Wilmington, we had to hit Ironclad because it’s fairly new, right downtown and just a neat place in general.
It was a Thursday afternoon, so we pretty much had the place all to ourselves which was cool, but also a little lame because the service was on the slow side. Because we were 2 of 4 patrons in the establishment, the employees were bunched up on the other bar talking among one another while they were chowing down on lunch. I get it, you gotta eat, you want the latest gossip, but don’t do that right in front of your patrons. On this note, our server was a little rude to us and when we were ordering (unlimited tasting before, so you can make an educated decision on what you want to drink), she told us to «fill this out,» it was a piece of paper indicating they were a private club. The club membership is $ 1 and good for a year. The reason they needed to move to a private club is due to liquor laws because they don’t serve food. With no food found at Ironclad, they give you the option to bring food in or to order delivery to the brewery, which is pretty cool.
The bar is so huge, you sit down and immediately will feel like you’re an elf, I don’t care if you are 6’6 or 5’1. I digress, right now there is a season beer — naturally it’s pumpkin – and they named it after the supposed ghost that haunts the brewery: Gib. Gib’s Pumpkin Ale was my favorite! In addition to offering their own beers, they have other local beers and ciders on tap!
Ironclad is huge venue which would be great for large parties or just grabbing a beer after work. From the looks of it, there was a stage where I believe they play live music on the weekends.

Alright, let me start off by saying that I’m not a beer snob. You could put PBR in a frosty mug and tell me it’s an IPA. So from reading the other reviews, this may not be the place for you if you’re there for the «brewery» part of Ironclad Brewery.
WIth that being said, I’m also not friends with those types of people so we really enjoy Ironclad for the space. You can take a group and not worry about finding a seat and then you can have a conversation because the music is never too loud. It’s clean and reasonably priced so it’s my type of bar. I actually ended up there at one point for my Bachelorette party and they put on Cher radio for us, which makes them okay in my book.

Ironclad has an awesome space with some potential for cool events, but the fact of the matter is that their beers just aren’t good. We came here a couple of months after they had opened, and were so excited to see such a cool venue. We ordered a flight with most of their offerings and there honestly wasn’t even one standout. Their beers are just kind of flat and tasteless.
The space is huge and they have a nice projector screen that they were showing Sports Center on while I was there. The service was nothing exceptional and the person manning the bar seemed to have no clue about the beer. That is super disappointing when you are trying beer on site and there is no one there to tell you about it.
I think this place works better as a bar/​special events space than it does a brewery. You can’t call yourself a brewery and not have the beer be your main priority. I could see this being a good spot to watch the game, and they do have some beer choices that are not of their own making. I actually discovered one of my favorite stouts here, Double Barley Steakcake Stout. Hopefully they can get their act together, but as of now it is definitely not a destination brewery.

I went to the Ironclad Brewery for a reception. It is conveniently located downtown, near a lot of hotels.
The gentleman tending bar was very friendly and answered my questions about the various beers, both their own and others from different N.C. breweries, and he gave me a few samples. I drank one of their ales, which was full of hops with a sharper-​than-​usual citrus taste but pleasant, and a pumpkin stout that was, as I recall, 10% ABV and had a real, up-​front pumpkin taste. I count it as one of the best stouts I have ever tasted.
The Brewery didn’t serve food but the reception was catered and it was a very good setting.

Great brewery! The beer is awesome! I tried both the White Squall Brown Ale and the Fish Tale Pale Ale and they were amazing! Great flavor and the bar staff was great also! Will return!

I have been here a few times, always saying that I will give it another chance. Unfortunately the beers are just, flat out, bad. The IPA has no complexity or citrus flavor. The «session IPA» tastes like the sweat that drips through your mustache after a good workout.
Unfortunately, this will be the last time I will come to Ironclad. I had high hopes when it was being built, but it just didn’t live up to the hype.

This place is needed in downtown Wilmington and it has an amazing potential, but maybe they need to get back to the basics. I am hoping I caught them on an off night because I really want to love this place…
First off, there was a very bad smell in the building that almost made me turn around and walk out before I was two steps in, after about 20 minutes they opened the doors for the live music and it aired out a bit, it was much more tolerable, unfortunately, I had my fill by then and wasn’t tempted to stay for the live music which normally keeps me around. The bartender seemed new or maybe just overwhelmed but was trying hard toward the end of our time there. The food menu is «third party» and that is fine to use a catering company, this place seems like it’s focus is confused on where they are placing their excellence. Venue is swanky, but smells like fertilizer, maybe that is a common smell for a distillery? Customer service with bar tenders could use improvement. Food menu: beef jerky is fine, the super limited hours and rotations of even more limited menu options since using catering company for their meals could use consistency for repeat business, maybe also adding larger selection of drafts and wine will encourage some loyal customers.
On a positive note: they did an amazing job with the renovations inside and outside.

We happened to park right in front of this before going on a ghost tour and had some time to kill. My friends mentioned it was new and wanted to check it out.
I was so happy to see that they had a cider option on tap, because I can’t have beer. I DO miss beer tremendously and used to do brewery tours all the time, so the hoppy brewery smell you get when you walk in was pretty wonderful.
I forget which cider they had on tap but it was dry and very drinkable.
Unfortunately there was no one here on a Friday night. Usually that’s a good thing but the place is huge and there were maybe 10 people there. That did mean service was prompt though.
Maybe word just needs to get out a bit and I hope it does. The lofted space is well designed and having indoor bags could be a lot of fun for a night out!

I’m currently sitting at the upstairs bar at Ironclad and I’m surprised that it’s not more crowded. I’m drinking a session beer which is light and very drinkable. The décor is beautiful, exposed beams, sleek lighting, open space. It would be a great venue for a wedding or large party. I’m not sure about the previous negative reviews because I’d much rather be here than some other, more well known breweries. That being said, I really hope this place does well because it’s a great atmosphere, solid beer, and really well thought out design. Give it a try!

I have tried a handful of new breweries that have gotten better with time so hopefully this will be the case for Ironclad. The beers were alright, it was my least favorite out of the breweries that we visited. I was excited to try the White Squall which is brewed with white chocolate but was not impressed. The brewery itself is awesome, the building is beautiful and the space is huge!

Ironclad is the newest brewery in town, opening this past March, and they’ve got some work cut out for themselves. You walk into the brewery and are immediately impressed by the space. Not only is it a huge space featuring a huge downstairs and tanks out in the open, but they also have a balcony with additional seating. Plus, you can’t help but admire the building, beautiful exposed brick, two bars directly across from one another and eye catching lighting. They’ve also have a projector television and a large stage with an impressive sound system. Unfortunately, they’re missing a key aspect of a brewery, beer that draws people back. I didn’t have a single beer during my tasting (of all seven of their beers) that would’ve brought me back for another pint. Some were okay, but none were memorable. Hopefully since they are a new brewery, they’re still working out the kinks and they’ll get a handle over their brewing process.
Plus, for such a huge space, it’s surprising that they don’t have food, just beer and wine. They do encourage you to BYOF (bring your own food) and eventually the idea is to have food trucks outside (unfortunately, Wilmington doesn’t have a large food truck scene as of yet though). You can purchase any 4oz pour and «make your own flight» for $ 1.75/pour or purchase a pint for $ 4+, so prices are just over what Front Street Brewery offers and just under what Flytrap offers. One thing I did notice is that the brewery doesn’t have the water jets to clean the glasses before they pour (making for a smoother pour). I’m very curious to see Ironclad becomes, but right now I get the feel that someone dumped a bunch of money into making a beautiful brewery without thinking about the logistics of the space. I could see this place currently as a music venue or dance space, but the brewery side is a little lacking (in beer light). I’d give them a few years to settle in before making this a destination spot.

I was here when they had been open for a few days. The building is awesome and I like the exposed walls etc. The only beer of their own craftsmanship was a Pale Ale which was nice with a very piney note on it. I plan on coming back soon to try more beers.

If you love beer and visit Wilmington do yourself a favor and check out Ironclad! This place has a superb selection of beers and the value is excellent. They also have some local bands that play often. Highly recommend it.

Fantastic brewery! They a nice projector tv. Also they have a full bar up stairs. The staff is outgoing and helpful when matching your taste buds with appropriate brew.

The size of this bar is amazing. Would make a good place for the first beer after parking, or the last bar before leaving town. It’s going to do very well.