Power tools and hard hats are nothing new around Marble Brewery, which has already seen major recent renovations to the patio and the bathrooms, with the brewery expansion still to come. Before that happens, however, the pub/taproom at the main brewery will get a much-needed makeover.

Beginning today (Monday) and running until March 6, the interior of the pub will be closed. Don’t freak out, you can still order a beer on the patio (weather-permitting, and lately the weather has been permitting a lot) while all of this is going on. You will not be completely shut out from drinking fresh Marble beers on draft downtown, but there may be days you have to go without (or drive to the Westside Taproom) if Mother Nature reverts to her usual unpredictable self here in New Mexico. In addition to having beers served outside, every Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights Marble will have Studio 111 in the brewery itself. Specifically, it’s the area in the southwest corner where you may have attended a Beer 101 class during ABQ Beer Week in the past. There will be a DJ spinning tunes and even a disco ball hanging from the ceiling. Plus, the whole area will smell of hops and malts. We will have the listings as part of Marble’s entry in The Week Ahead in Beer.

Anyway, as for the details on the construction itself, I was lucky enough to run into Walt Gill of Modulus Design, the contractor, while I was enjoying a cask of Marble Red on Friday afternoon. He and his company were the ones who already redid the bathrooms back at the same time as the patio renovation, and lord knows how many of you have told us how much you love what they did to improve those bathrooms. (Do take note, there may be some days where the indoor bathrooms will not be accessible due to construction, so external facilities will be made available to customers on a temporary basis.) So with a glance at the plans, here is all that they will be doing in the next three weeks.

First up, that wall where the office is in the northeast corner, and the office itself, will be gone. The lounge area currently in the southeast corner will be moved into the new area, which they will be able to convert into a stage so small musical acts can play there in the winter. E-Rock’s friends, The Lonesome Heroes, had to play Marble Westside when they recently came through town (it was before the weather got happy) and they told us they would really welcome the chance to play downtown in colder months since they really like the crowd there. It was not a dig against the Westside crowd, but having been to both, I can say the downtown crowd in general is younger and more in tune (pun intended) with the music. They’re still getting used to live music west of the river, it seems.

The floor underneath will be concrete now, as the current wood boards will be ripped up and then used elsewhere. Now you don’t have to worry about splinters should you stumble and the hit the ground. Just please don’t stumble and hit the ground. You might hurt yourself. And spill your beer. The latter would be tragic, especially if it were the Imperial Stout or Imperial Red.

There four-person tables that people try to pack a dozen friends around will be removed. In their place will be bigger, “communal” tables similar to the ones outside on the patio. Based on the blueprints, there look to be about four of these big suckers inside. There will be three in the center and one near the stage/lounge area.

Up above on the ceiling, all that duct work that is above the eastern side of the taproom will shift toward the west side, above the bar. The bar area will also be redone, giving everyone a little more room back there — Leah Black and the rest of the beeristas seemed very excited about the prospect of no longer weaving around one another and tripping over each other so constantly — which should in turn increase efficiency in terms of getting your beer to you even faster.

Add it all up and once again Marble is doing their best to make the onsite drinking experience better. Rather than get all swept up in just packaging and distributing, they are honoring their loyal, local customer base. So hopefully everyone can grin and bear it through the next three weeks. As long as the weather holds, you can still enjoy a pint on the patio, and the Studio 111 could be fun for those who enjoy DJs and dancing (we’re clearly not those people in the Crew, so instead you can hang out with us at the Napalm Death show at Sunshine on Feb. 24, which just happens to be Brandon’s birthday, too). Oh, and thanks to Leah for some of the additional information. We expect she’ll be sharing some amusing photos on social media of the staff getting their groove on after work beneath that disco ball.

We will keep everyone up to date on the progress of the taproom renovations, and hopefully we will soon see the start of the brewery expansion as well.

Cheers!

— Stoutmeister