Our Story

In 2014, Pat McInerney opened a small, raucous brewery in St Peters. The kind of place where you didn't need to be a local to feel like one.

He named it after a figure from the neighbourhood's past: Willie the Boatman. A Scottish convict who spent his days rowing people across the Cooks River, swapping stories with strangers, charging what they could afford.

The brewery

It grew out of secondhand dairy equipment, bought and bolted together on a shoestring, and a simple belief that great beer starts with honest ingredients and good people. From the first pours, people went nuts for it.

Willie became known as the community brewery. Not just because of where it sat, but because of who it welcomed. It was queer-friendly before anyone talked about that. It backed public education, local campaigns and community causes. It named its beers after real people — living legends of the inner west with real stories and real character.

One of them was Albo. Named after Anthony Albanese, the local MP and long-time mate of Pat's who would go on to become Prime Minister of Australia.

The firsts

Willie the Boatman brewed some firsts, too. Old Salty was the first gose brewed commercially in Australia. Nectar of the Hops was the first New England IPA brewed commercially in Australia. Wide-eyed and bushy-browed, the team scoured the globe in search of ingredients and came back with something no one had tasted here before.

The taproom

The taproom is taking a breather while the builders do their thing. It'll be back before you know it — bigger, louder and ready to pour. In the meantime, the beer is very much still out there in the world, and so is Pat.

Willie the Boatman is still about different characters finding common ground, one distinctive beer at a time.