The Mill Brewery

Collingwood is home to an impressive number of small breweries, pubs and craft beer bars, but it’s not just the scale of postcode 3066’s beer scene that makes it impressive, it’s also the scope.

The breweries that have turned many of Collingwood’s old warehouses into watering holes and community hubs have done so with their own particular style and flair in a manner that makes any journey between them one of distinction and discovery.

The Mill Brewery captures the essence of Collingwood’s modern beer scene perfectly: despite being housed in an old warehouse, it’s a place that feels effortlessly intimate, relaxed and idiosyncratic. Not that it came to life effortlessly: founder Mirek Aldridge spent more than a decade mulling the concept before throwing open the doors to the public in March 2017.

Inspiration came while enjoying a Little Creatures Pale Ale with his brother at that brewery’s Fremantle home, inspiration that in turn led to homebrewing followed by a rapid progression from kits to all grain brewing.

As his interest in brewing turned into an obsession, Mirek told friends, family and anyone else who would listen about his intention to open a brewery, all while working in the film and TV industry on some of the country’s finest, as he puts it, “trashy dramas”.

It wasn’t until the end of 2016, however, that he took over an old mechanics’ garage in Sackville Street, just a couple of minutes’ walk from the junction of Smith and Johnston Streets, and began designing and building the small brewpub himself. Now, in place of the mechanics' gear you find a warm and inviting space named after the hand-cranked Corona mill that did him proud during his homebrewing days.

The back of the warehouse is taken up by a 600L brewhouse, while the front bar is divided between shared tables, cosy couches, a warming fireplace and its own arcade machine. It’s a setup that makes full use of its industrial setting: rows of skylights and the large roller door allow light to flood in during daylight hours; red gum tables line the walls indoors while the bar takes centre stage, welcoming you inside to enjoy a beer.

When the taps are pouring, the driveway out front features more tables, lending the venue the feel of a neighbourhood pub. On a warm afternoon, expect to catch the sound of lively chatter between mates before the brewery is in sight.

If you're looking for a meal to match your beers, Melbourne's cult favourite taco slingers, Dingo Ate My Taco, are responsible for the food – and if you've never tried one of their tacos with a fresh, hoppy beer, well, let's just say The Mill's locals know what you're missing out on. Indeed, whether they’re there for the tacos or weeknight trivia, The Mill has cemented itself as a brewery for locals as well as those who’ve travelled to check out the surrounding beer scene.

For the first few years of The Mill’s existence, Mirek and his team’s focus was almost entirely on their surrounds too, with only the odd larger batch making it into cans and further afield. But, as demand grew, so did they: in late 2021, one became two as they commissioned a 30-hectolitre production brewery in Thomastown. They chose the new brewery’s opening as the moment to introduce a core range of Cracking Lager, Daydream Session Ale, Mosaic Pale and El Toro IPA, and ramped up distribution significantly.

They don’t just produce beer, either, but even their hard seltzer is in keeping with the brewery’s ethos. While many on the market take inspiration for their look, feel and marketing from health drinks, Serenity’s has taken a road less travelled: it’s inspired by metal music, a theme you’ll spot throughout the brewery’s branding too.

Despite the expansion, not only does brewing continue on the original 600-litre system but The Mill’s heart also remains firmly in Collingwood; call in and you’ll often find the wider brewery team sharing ideas with locals over a beer.

It may have been a decade in the making but, with The Mill now ingrained in the Collingwood community and their beers a regular sight across the city and state, you can’t help but feel it was well worth the wait.

Name
The Mill Brewery
Address

40 Sackville Street
Collingwood
VIC 3066

Open Hours

Wed & Thurs: 4pm to 10pm
Friday: 12pm to 11pm
Saturday: 12pm to 11pm
Sunday: 12pm to 8pm


This is a directory listing. To find out more, head here

The Mill Brewery Regulars

The Mill Brewery Cracking Lager

Crack Even if you’re just opening a can of soft drink, there are few sounds quite as satisfying. But when it’s been a long day and you’re cracking a can of lager, it does feel that little bit more special. The Mill Brewery’s Cracking Lager is the kind of beer that’s ready for those moments when work is over, the weekend is beginning or when you’ve just started catching up with a loved one you haven’t seen in too long. It’s easy drinking, pours a bright and pale yellow and provides… Read more
Style
Lager
ABV
4.0%

The Mill Brewery Daydream Session Ale

If your idea of a great time is drinking a refreshing hoppy beer in the sun, then The Mill have you covered with their Daydream Session Ale. It pours a clear and pale yellow and provides soft layers of modern hop notes that many know and love with citrus in the shape of grapefruit, light pine, resin and some more perfumey notes of potpourri. Add in a clean and crisp finish and a soft bitterness and you have a beer ready to transport you to any place you've been dreaming about.… Read more
Style
Pale Ale
ABV
4.6%

The Mill Brewery Mosaic Pale Ale

Mosaic continues to be one of the most popular US hops out there and it feels like much of its success is driven by how well it works when used alone. Some hops seem to do wonder when working with others and while a bit of Mosaic can work well when mixed in with others, it’s a beauty when it enjoys the limelight. The Mill Brewery’s Mosaic Pale Ale is an excellent showcase of that hops’ many fruited sides with the classic American pale moving between pawpaw, candied orange, stone fruit and… Read more
Style
Pale Ale
ABV
5.1%

The Mill Brewery El Toro IPA

The Mill Brewery’s El Toro is an IPA with feet (or is it hooves?) in a couple of different camps. On the one hand, it pours with a slight orange haze and provides quite a tropical mix of fruit salad notes from its hops. But on the other, it’s quite dry and clean and along with orange peel and a bitter bite, there’s quite a bit of resinous pine that takes it away from the hazy camp and much more into West Coast territory. In other words, it’s a modern IPA that’s set to suit a range of palates.… Read more
Style
IPA
ABV
6.7%

The Mill Brewery Specials

The Mill Brewery Disgorged

Published Yesterday
It turns out The Mill Brewery can get more metal. When All Gas No Breaks was released in April, it wasn’t just the beer inside that was dark; the can design’s blistering flames and skeletal hot rod seemed plucked from the darkest recesses of a brewer’s mind. Now we are Disgorged with a barrel-aged imperial stout that has been aging in the famous catacombs beneath Collingwood with their rivers of blood. OK, so hopefully we haven't started any conspiracy theories there but what is entirely real… Read more
Style
Barrel-Aged Imperial Stout
ABV
10.5%

The Mill Brewery Deadwood Red & Cannonball

Published May 4, 2023
Deadwood’s cancellation remains one of modern TV’s greatest crimes and, while we did get to enjoy a movie some years later, that took an awful long time. Beer drinkers don’t have to wait as long for The Mill Brewery’s Deadwood Red, however, with the red IPA a regularly returning favourite from the brewery. It returns in 2023 in smaller, 375ml cans for the first time but it still brings a surprisingly dry finish for beer rich in caramel, toffee and biscuit, accompanied by hop-derived orange,… Read more
Style
Red IPA & Oak-Aged Scotch Ale
ABV
6.8% & 8.2%

The Mill Brewery All Gas No Breaks

Published April 19, 2023
Brewing beer on a quiet Collingwood street brings plenty of benefits like an eager audience and neighbourly breweries to bounce ideas and build relationships with. But it means there are other makers of delicious drinks to collaborate with too, with The Mill popping next door for their imperial stout, All Gas No Breaks. The 10.2 percent ABV beer uses cold brew from Everyday Coffee and while there might be quite a long list, it may well be the most metal Mill can design to date. The big beer is incredibly… Read more
Style
Imperial Stout
ABV
10.2%

The Mill Brewery Freshest Haze 2023

Published April 13, 2023
Freshest Haze is a longstanding favourite for the crew at The Mill Brewery with the IPA only returning once a year but always exciting hop heads. Its release has grown into quite a launch event too, with the DDH hazy beer now showcased alongside a mix of wet hop beers from some of Victoria's finest breweries at the Fresh Hop Tap Takeover. It’s also picked up a prestigious AIBA gold medal over its life and the 2023 version of Freshest Haze certainly tastes a whole lot like a walk through a hop… Read more
Style
Wet Hop DDH Hazy IPA
ABV
7.0%

The Mill Brewery Oishii

Published February 15, 2023
Occasionally a beer name comes along that just perfectly captures the drink at hand. Oishii, which refers to nice, tasty or delicious in Japanese, is just such a name. The Mill Brewery’s Japanese rice lager is restrained but filled with delicate flavours and that balance is perfectly captured by the accompanying artwork of Yue Yamanaka. The incredibly pale straw lager is dry, refreshing and easy-drinking thanks to the heavy use of flaked rice with only a gentle wave of floral notes and flavours… Read more
Style
Japanese Rice Lager
ABV
4.5%

The Mill Brewery Tiki Lounge

Published January 26, 2023
They’ve never been afraid of big flavours at The Mill Brewery and while Tiki Lounge might be here for long lazy afternoons, there’s a lot to unpack as you unwind. The sour takes the tropical tones of mango, passionfruit, guava and lime and while multiple fruits can at times get lost within a beer, here none of them do. Sure, the lime might be a little lighter than the mango, passionfruit and guava but it adds a zest to the beer’s tartness to keep the sweeter fruits nicely balanced. Fruited… Read more
Style
4.5%
ABV
Tropical Salted Sour

The Mill Brewery Pink Motel

Published October 21, 2022
Here’s a little lesson you probably don’t need. Cheap motels in summer: bad. However, Pink Motel in summer: good. The beer by The Mill Brewery is a warm weather favourite they’ve brewed before but has returned in time for summer 2022 in 375ml cans with a new look and recipe tweak. It's a sour that's been made with sweet cherry, raspberry, key lime and blackcurrant to recreate the fruity flavours you’d find in a Rosé. Even though it might be what’s on the inside that counts, the beer… Read more
Style
Rosé Sour
ABV
4.1%

The Mill Brewery Southern Lights

Published September 30, 2022
Back in April, The Mill Brewery explored some of the northern hemisphere's favourite hops with Northern Lights and for Spring 2022, they’ve looked to the skies a little closer to home. Southern Lights is an NZ IPA brewed with Nelson Sauvin and Nectaron, alongside some additional Idaho 7 and Citra Cryo from the US. It’s quite a modern IPA too and borrows from both the West Coast and juicy camps with a combined wealth brought by a soft and lush mouthfeel and a decent bitterness. The hops meanwhile… Read more
Style
NZ IPA
ABV
6.2%

The Mill Brewery Skeleton Crew

Published September 8, 2022
Skeleton Crew is a beer that really captures the ethos of The Mill Brewery. For one, the can’s artwork - by Dave Long - taps into the Melbourne brewery’s longtime love of classic arcade games and metal music. But secondly, it shows off the brewery’s knack for making balanced dark beers with the oyster stout combining traditional and rich English stout flavours with a refreshing and light finish. The base beer uses a mix of English malts and the classic hop Fuggles with oysters, ocean water… Read more
Style
Oyster Stout
ABV
7.0%

The Mill & Everyday Coffee Mènage à trois

Published May 22, 2020
Collingwood’s The Mill Brewery has been one of the small brewers embracing tinnies as a means of getting their beer into homes, ratcheting up the frequency of their canned releases since COVID-19 hit. Among their autumnal releases is Ménage à trois, a collaboration with neighbours Everyday Coffee that’s made its first appearance in cans after appearing as a keg only release in 2019. Dubbed a Coffee Chocolate Vanilla Porter, it’s brewed with cold brewed Mucho Gusto – a bold espresso blend… Read more
Style
Coffee Chocolate Vanilla Porter
ABV
4.4%

The Mill Brewery Altered Beast IPA

Published November 12, 2019
Anyone who’s ever played Altered Beast will know it to be a game where a man transforms into a werewolf or dragon to battle underworld monsters. Apparently, if you get far enough you can turn into a bear too. How does it end? Who’s to say, it’s damn near impossible to finish and the game feels more like it was designed to take coins from kids in the 80s rather than being purely about fun. At Collingwood’s The Mill Brewery, they keep their Altered Beast on free play because the crew are not… Read more
Style
IPA
ABV
6.3%
Stockists

Beer 360

Galah

Samuel Pepys Wine Merchant

Hippo Bottle & Bar

Penny Young

Red Sparrow

More stockists...

The Mill Brewery Freshest Haze IPA

Published April 30, 2019
The Mill in Collingwood is one of a handful of mainland breweries to have taken part in the annual Fresh Hop Beer Festival in Launceston, Saint John Craft Beer's celebration of the annual hop harvest. The 2019 festival was their second visit and saw them take an equally hazy approach to the previous year, albeit with a few tweaks – namely, more hops in both whirlpool and at the dry-hopping stage plus more booze. They might not have been the biggest of changes, but clearly they worked as Freshest… Read more
Style
Galaxy Wet Hop DDH NEIPA
ABV
7.0%

The Mill Brewery Grapefruit Paradisi

Published March 28, 2019
Collingwood brewpub The Mill is turning two with a party featuring the tapping of two new beers. And they couldn't be much further apart on the beer spectrum, with one a grapefruit XPA and the other a whisky barrel-aged strong ale with habaneros. Grapefruit Paradisi is, obviously, the former, a hazy pale yellow beer featuring both grapefruit and orange zest plus a late addition of grapefruit juice. And, thanks to the pithy character of citrus zest and, according to brewer Mirek, the juice itself,… Read more
Style
Citrus XPA
ABV
5.2%
Stockists

Hitting taps on March 30 for the 2nd birthday

The Mill Brewery Chilli Willie

Published March 28, 2019
One of two beers brewed for The Mill's second birthday and one that's been underway since the first, this is a strong ale that spent a few months ageing in keg before spending a further six months in Lark Distillery whisky barrels – the last two of those months with ten habanero chillies for company. The rich malt character of the base beer – originally as a US-inspired strong ale, but with time having softened the impact of the hops and boosted its sweet toffee and biscuit side – provides… Read more
Style
Whisky Barrel-Aged Chilli Strong Ale
ABV
8.0%
Stockists

Launched on March 30 at The Mill's 2nd birthday

The Mill Brewery I Can't Believe It's Not Juice

Published November 6, 2018
It’s been a long time between packaged releases for The Mill Brewery. Close to a year ago, the Collingwood brewery came out with The Great Russian, a Lark Distillery whisky barrel aged imperial stout with an ABV above ten percent. This time around, the crew at the Mill has gone for a slightly more warm weather appropriate approach by releasing cans of one of the taproom’s top sellers, the New England IPA I Can’t Believe It’s Not Juice. Coming in a label that makes no secret of the fact the… Read more
Style
NEIOA
ABV
6.8%

The Mill & The Mill Imperial Red Ale

Published March 1, 2018
Given the occasional – and occasionally very high profile – stoushes within the beer world around names and trademarks, you couldn't help wonder if there may be some repercussions when The Mill Brewery opened in Collingwood last year when been The Mill craft beer bar had already operating in Brisbane for the past few years. And, indeed, there have been repercussions. Yes, the crew from the latter hooked up with the former's founder and head brewer Mirek to make a beer together. They opted for… Read more
Style
Imperial Red Ale
ABV
7.7%

The Mill Brewery The Great Russian Barrel Aged Stout 2017

Published December 22, 2017
When it came time to create its first bottled beer, The Mill Brewery didn't mess around. At the height of summer, the Collingwood brewery released The Great Russian, a barrel aged stout that spent six months soaking in Lark Distillery whisky barrels. Since the un-barrelled stout from whence it came weighed in at 8.1 percent ABV and the Lark laden equivalent registers a full 2.2 percent ABV higher, you can be sure the whisky makes itself known. Aromas of peat with a hint of woody vanilla leap from… Read more
Style
Whisky Barrel Aged Imperial Stout
ABV
10.3%

The Mill Brewery Tropicool Pale Ale

Published August 1, 2017
Tropicool has always been popular at The Mill's taproom and stands apart from the other pale ale it sits next to thanks in the main to the choice of hops, with punchy new varieties Idaho 7, Mosaic and El Dorado doing their thing. They do it in such a way it's easy to see why the beer found favour in the current climate, with pineapple and citrus leading the way in a tropically minded drop in which bitterness is kept to a minimum.… Read more
Style
Pale Ale
ABV
5.0%

The Mill Brewery Jack D-Licious Golden Ale

Published March 15, 2017
Jack D-Licious (not his real surname) is a beer designed to tick a couple of boxes: the beer for those new to craft and not wanting to be hit too hard on the palate and those who are simply after something simple to sit on. There's a smidgen of fruitiness from the Amarillo hops, some biscuity malt flavours and a dry more than bitter finish.… Read more
Style
Golden Ale
ABV
4.9%

The Mill Brewery Mostly American Pale Ale

Published March 15, 2017
Mostly American does what it says on the tin, delivering a pale ale with mostly American ingredients, with some German hops and English malt along for the ride. With iconic US hop Cascade leading the way, it's more akin to the old school American pales like Sierra Nevada than the fruitier new wave. Earthy, piney and with a pretty hefty bitterness, it's the brewery staff's go to beer.… Read more
Style
American Pale Ale
ABV
5.5%

The Mill Brewery The Dark Lord Black IPA

Published March 15, 2017
Dark Lord is a name that comes with serious pedigree in the world thanks to the legend that is and that surrounds 3 Floyds' Russian imperial stout of the name. So, if you're going to adopt it for one of your own, there's probably a bit of pressure. The Dark Lord from The Mill is a beer that Mirek Aldridge had been brewing and tweaking at home for years before launching his brewery: a black IPA weighing in at 6.66 percent ABV. Black IPA seems to have become a pretty broad church since the oxymoronic… Read more
Style
Black IPA
ABV
6.66%