From California fields to the back row.
Fully licensed, 1 BBL, and hidden in the back of a 150+ year-old Victorian we share with our sister organization, Shapeshifters Cinema.
A brewery built for the audience.
Shapeshifters started as a DIY, volunteer-run microcinema for experimental and artist-made film, video, sound and music. The brewery grew out of the same spirit: make something small, handmade and local, and share it with the people in the room.
Today we brew small-batch beer from locally sourced, California-grown, seasonally available ingredients — and pour it on-site during screenings, performances and special events, with cans to take home from our storefront shop.
When the pandemic shut our doors for over a year, we kept going — livestreaming artists’ work, hosting artist-led workshops and opening an online shop. We came back with more beer than ever.
Every batch is hand-crafted.
Our tiny “nano-brewery” is an all-electric, three-kettle, American-made stainless steel wonder by Blichmann Engineering. Each batch makes about two 15.5-gallon kegs, fermented in a stainless steel unitank, with temperature held precisely by a tiny glycol chiller.
Batch
1 barrel · two 15.5-gal kegs · ~248 pints
Grain
Floor-malted California barley from Admiral Maltings
Packaging
On tap at shows · cans to go
We brew with barley grown by California farmers and floor-malted just across the estuary in Alameda.Pictured: Gilbert at the Admiral Maltings 2024 barley harvest
In the news & around town
Comcast RISE awards Shapeshifters a small-business grant
We received a small-business grant plus a year of free business consulting and education from the Comcast RISE program.
About the program →KQED on the state of Bay Area film culture
After SFMOMA cut its film program, KQED’s Sarah Hotchkiss looked at how microcinemas like Shapeshifters keep Bay Area film culture alive.
Read the article →Jack London Improvement District funds our shop expansion
Funding from the JLID is building out shelving and stock for artist books, records, DVDs, art and handmade goods at our venue.
See the announcement →
Thank you to our donors & funders
We rely on individual donations to support artists and run our cinema, and we’re immensely grateful for every contribution. View our donors →
New releases, pop-ups & screenings.
Our batches are tiny — about 248 pints each — and they go fast. Get a heads-up before the next one drops.