Craft Brewery and Restaurant Officially Coming to Downtown LG

For years John and Wendy Rohan have dreamed of bringing a brewery and restaurant to downtown La Grange.

When that initially didn’t work out, they instead started La Grange Brewing Company in 2019 at their Blissful Folly Farm near Nechanitz, adding home-brewed beer to an already robust rural mead and wine operation.

But their dream remained. Recently the La Grange Economic Development Corporation made a renewed push to revitalize downtown’s evening restaurant scene. The EDC bought the old D&G office supply building at 256 W. Colorado Street with the intention of renting it out as a restaurant (longtime locals may remember it used to be a thriving Mr. Gatti’s pizza place starting in 1983 before it closed in the 1990s) John Rohan said that out of about eight interested parties, four made presentations to the EDC.

But the Rohans were chosen.

Just days ago, the EDC officially announced that the site would be the future home of La Grange Brewing and the Rohans would operate a craft brewery and gastropub in the location.

John Rohan said there will be enough space in the back of the location to brew beer on site (though they will also continue brewing at their original location too) and the menu of the new restaurant will be “German-inspired with a Texas twist.”

They plan to be open for lunch and dinner.

The Rohans will continue to operate Blissful Folly Farm, but the hours of operation may be scaled back some to accommodate their new venture downtown.

“We hope this is a step in bringing more life and vitality to the downtown core,” said La Grange City Manager Jack Thompson. “We’re excited about having them. The great thing about La Grange Brewing is that they are already known, they have a following, they have a good customer base, and they have a good game plan.”

According to Thompson, the framework of the agreement between the EDC and the Rohans is a 10-year lease that will begin Jan. 1, 2026 (which is roughly the expected opening date).

“Until then they have occupancy of the building. They will begin work there the week of May 19 ... The EDC is putting in north of $400,000 for what is called ‘tenent improvements.’ There are quite a bit of improvements above and beyond that they will be responsible for,” Thompson said. “The reason for the assistance is that in the restaurant business, the reason places fail is because of the amount of debt going into a project is significant, moreso than a typical business.

“We wanted to set them up to be as successful as they can, so that they can thrive ... We do hope to get that money back. We have an option for them to purchase the building after a certain amount of time, so a lot of the money we’ve spent can be recouped on the back end – plus they will be paying rent.”

Thompson said this opening will hopefully have a snowball effect for more nightlife businesses to come to downtown.

Now the hard work begins for the Rohans, transforming a building that hasn’t been a restaurant in a generation back into one.

But they have the right guy to help do it.

John said their general contractor, La Grange-native Bryan Schramm, actually used to work at the building as a high schooler when it was a Mr. Gattis.

Since the announcement was made public, John said he and Wendy have heard from a lot of folks excited about the new venture.

“There’s been a ton of excitement,” John said. “And we want people to follow along on our journey,” adding that they would track the progress of their work on the building and the business on their social media channels.