Brewery Floor ready for spills

Brewery Floor Ready for Spills

December 9th, 2023

The Tasting Room Floor

Complementing the blue brewery walls and the dark black ceiling is a new epoxy floor.

Contractors poured and finished the epoxy floor over a 10-day period. The exotic and eye-catching appearance comes from the special metallic epoxy. The epoxy is mixed with a fine metallic powder.

“It’s fairly tricky to pour,” Matt Ritz, the owner of Hawk Mountain Brewery, said.


When asked if the bowling ball-looking floor was inspired by the movie The Big Lebowski, a movie that three of Matt’s pets were named after, Matt says, "No, it’s just a coincidence.” When asked if he plans on naming any beers after the movie, Matt responds, “Obviously you're not a winemaker.”

The floor of the tasting room is an epoxy that is 60% black, 30% silver, and 10% white.

”You pretty much just mix it and pour it out of a bucket,” Matt says. ”Then you hit it with little rollers to make the swirls. Some of the swirls are just from the flow. The metallic epoxy is very fluid, and you can see how some of the patterns formed from how it flowed.” The epoxy pattern was poured from a corner of the brewery in a way to make it seem very natural-looking when you first walk in.

When asked if there were any complications, Matt explains, ”There were a lot of bubbles when they first poured it. It looks like the moon, like the craters on the moon. So, the colors fell into the bubbles, but it gives it a pretty neat look. It was a mistake, but it actually looks pretty interesting.”

Matt says he plans on adding Christmas lights to the ceiling, which might look like stars and compliment the moon-looking floor.

”It cost about three times as much as the floor in the brewery, but I really like how it turned out,” Matt says.

The Brewery Floor

The floor where the actual brewing will happen is also special. It is resistant to acids, hot liquids, and cleaning chemicals that will be used in the brewing process.

Matt Ritz, the owner of Hawk Mountain Brewery, has finished this epoxy floor himself.

Cleanliness from Wall to Floor

There are no cracks between the wall and the floor. Every wall in this building can be sprayed down, leaving nowhere for dirt or bacteria to grow.

This was by design. The bottom sheet of drywall is the same specialty board that is used in bathrooms; it’s called green board.

This “green” board (the purple wall pictured) is treated with chemicals and has a wax surface, which helps prevent the growth of mildew and bacteria.

The green board was painted with one-part epoxy paint and has a special epoxy cove mounding.

This design was only mandatory in the kitchen and in the brewery, but Matt decided it would be prudent to apply it to every room.