The owner of East Nashville brewery Living Waters hopes to open a West Side location this spring in the Nations space last home to Czann's Brewing Co.
Ryan McCay will operate the brewery in a former church located at 4909 Indiana Ave. Relatedly, he has acquired the Czann’s brewing equipment from former owner Ken Rebman.
McCay operates the East Nashville Living Waters at 1056 E. Trinity Lane in a building located next to the structure home to Grimey's New and Preloved Music record store. He opened the business, a combination craft brewery and coffee shop, in 2019 and will remain operational at that site once opened on the city’s West Side.
Living Waters is known for offering beers many other local breweries do not, with an emphasis on small-batch production. These less commonly found beers include but are not limited to a French pilsner, a Japanese rice lager, a Belgian triple, an Italian pilsner, a Kellerbier and a hybrid IPA (that combines elements of a West Coast IPA and a cold IPA).
Living Waters opens at 8 a.m. every day and sells its lagers and ales starting at that time Mondays through Saturdays, rendering it the only local brewery to offer beer on tap any day prior to 11 a.m. The business employs about seven individuals and plans to hire at least three to five employees for his West Side taproom.
McCay tells Scene sister publication the Nashville Post he plans eventually to brew about 80 percent of his beer in The Nations. He is not disclosing the cost to get operational.
"By opening this new brewing facility, we’ll be able to improve our mash efficiencies and production workflows," McCay says. "This will save us a ton of headache and help us focus on making the beer we love rather than being so space-constrained."
McCay started canning some Living Waters beers when the pandemic hit in 2020, a move he feels spared his business from having to cease operations.
Czann’s closed in late 2024, with Rebman (an accountant by trade) telling the Post he planned to retire from brewing yet hoped a brewery would take the space in The Nations.
Rebman opened Czann’s (pronounced “Zahn’s” as one syllable) in December 2020 in a Nations building that once had accommodated the sanctuary of a church.
Local real estate investor Jeff Estepp owns the building.
This article was first published by our sister publication, the Nashville Post.
