Two Brothers Brewing taps apartment developer for big Warrenville project

The Two Brothers Tap House is admittedly “off the beaten path.”

The brewery operation is also housed in the same building, tucked in the back of an industrial park on the edge of Fermilab.

Two Brothers Brewing Co. plans to keep the brewery where it is — “let it keep doing its thing,” co-founder Jason Ebel said — but move the tap house to a new building fronting a major road — Route 59 — as part of a much larger proposed development in Warrenville.

“This is honestly like the culmination of what we’ve been striving for,” Ebel said.

He and his brother Jim are the OGs of the suburban craft beer scene. Two Brothers started in the 1990s — “we set out just to make beer and have fun” — and now their kids are in the company. Jason Ebel’s son runs the coffee roasting division.

“Over the last several years, especially since COVID, our coffee company has just really grown kind of off the chart. It's taken on an incredible life of its own, which is very exciting,” Jason Ebel said.

The Ebel siblings originally envisioned creating a Two Brothers campus with the brewery and restaurant at the vacant, northwest corner of Butterfield Road and Route 59. Ebel Properties LLC owns the site. But the pandemic hit, and the craft beer industry has changed a lot since that time, Ebel said.

“As we were coming out of COVID, we decided that it was time to do something with the land, and we knew we needed to do something different,” Ebel said.

Enter Phil Domenico. His company’s latest project has brought new apartments to the Yorktown Center campus, adding more built-in customers for the shopping mall in Lombard.

“The Chicagoland suburbs has been very, very good to us, and there’s just a significant amount of demand for luxury — highly amenitized luxury — multifamily apartments,” said Domenico, one of the owners of Synergy Construction & Development.

The first phase of construction alone features more than 270 units. The Yorktown Reserve complex also offers what Domenico says are “external” amenities: easy access to the Gia Mia pizzeria, Dave & Buster’s and other restaurants that have opened in and around the mall in recent years.

“We have been a catalyst. As soon as they saw our building going up, the retail tenants said, ‘OK, I can see a path,’’” Domenico said.

One of Yorktown’s old anchors — a Carson’s department store — was also torn down to pave the way for a public plaza between the mall and the apartments.

“Leasing has been phenomenal,” Domenico said. “We're going to open with probably 100 leases in June at Yorktown.”

Building on that momentum, Synergy recently met with the Warrenville plan commission for an informal courtesy review of a proposal for the property at Butterfield and Route 59. The developer is partnering with Two Brothers on plans to transform the site — some 20 acres — with a mix of residential, commercial and shared green space.

Synergy proposes a 180-unit residential development on part of it. The walk-up apartments would be spread across nine, two-story buildings with 20 units each — “more like a townhome setup,” Domenico said. A large clubhouse would offer indoor and outdoor amenities: a pool, gym, sauna, golf simulator, offices, DIY activity room and gazebo.

The Two Brothers restaurant would serve as a morning cafe showcasing their coffees before turning into a lunch and dinner tap house. To the west of it, a communal green space could host music events, a farmers market, Christmas markets or other gatherings.

“So we really see activating that quite a bit and bringing the community to this really beautiful outdoor green space, even though it’s right there on a major intersection,” Ebel said.

Preliminary site plans show what the entire corner could look like: the Two Brothers building with a patio, another drive-through restaurant, a larger restaurant, a multi-tenant building, and a lot potentially for office or detention space.

Synergy aims to submit a formal zoning application in the summer. The city would conduct a public hearing process before the plan commission. The city council would get the final say. Any TIF assistance would also require the council’s approval.

“You've got a built-in clientele that's going to be there every day,” Ebel said of the apartment residents. “They're going to see those businesses, and they're going to want to support them.”