BRONZEVILLE — Causes to celebrate haven’t been easy to come by in Chicago’s craft beer industry this year — but that’s not stopping Moor’s Brewing Co. from throwing its biggest party yet.

In fact, being the life of the party has become a core part of the Black-owned brewery’s brand as it prepares to celebrate its fifth anniversary at the annual Emancipation Ball June 18 at CineCity Studios, 2429 W. 14th St.

“The beer is an anchor. But we’re really brand-focused, brand-forward and looking to expand what a beer brand looks like,” said Jamhal Johnson, one of Moor’s Brewing’s three South Side-based co-founders. “We can make it look great. We can be creative. We can have fun.”

Moor’s expects 1,000 people to attend this year’s Emancipation Ball, held annually on the eve of Juneteenth. Doubling as an anniversary bash and a benefit for the brand’s Care Moor Foundation, it will be headlined by a DJ set from neo-soul legend Erykah Badu. At least a dozen Black-owned restaurants and food vendors will offer up bites all evening, and there will be an open bar stocked with Black-owned beer, wine and spirit brands.

For Johnson, the occasion is meant to “highlight freedom, success, entrepreneurship — just what Juneteenth was, I think, supposed to actually mean.”

“There are not often times we even have things to celebrate,” he said.

Tickets for the event, which starts 7 p.m., start at $161.90 and are available here.

Johnson co-founded the Bronzeville-based Moor’s Brewing Co. alongside Damon Patton and Anthony Bell in 2021, entering a beer industry where just 1 percent of all breweries were Black-owned, according to the National Black Brewing Association. Moor’s fifth anniversary finds it on the heels of national recognition — and mentorship — from an industry giant, as well as transition: It’s again looking for the right location to plant a flag in the city after a Logan Square partnership with another brewery fell apart last year.

Moor’s maintains a dialed-in portfolio of traditional beer styles such as a Munich helles lager, a traditional IPA, a clean kolsch ale and an imperial porter that offers up lavender and blueberry aromas before the first sip.

Its beers are contract-brewed by Homewood Brewing Company in the south suburbs. Johnson said a New York-based brewery is also producing Moor’s beers as it expands its distribution on the East Coast. Rather than lean on punchy names or pop-culture references, Moor’s opts to put its brand first on its packaging, Johnson said.

Moor’s signature beer labels prominently feature a remixed version of the Dutch painting, “The African King Caspar.” Each label tells about the journey of the Moors of Berber from Africa into Europe, where they ruled Spain for hundreds of years. During that time, they introduced distillation and fermentation techniques to the European culture: “This beer pays homage to the rich untold history of our African ancestry and the ORIGINAL CRAFTSMEN that made it happen.”

“You pick a concept, an idea, dive deeper into it, learn about the history and use it to tell a story that’s bigger than your story as individuals,” said Josh Deth, the founder of Revolution Brewing, whose branding itself amplifies local and national historical figures.

Revolution was part of a busy 2025 for Moor’s, as the two breweries collaborated to produce a Polish-style pilsner dubbed “Moorvolution” that was served at Pittsburgh’s annual Barrel and Flow Festival, an event that showcases Black-owned breweries on the rise. For the record, Deth said, the Revolution founder would love to make that beer again.

Also last year, Moor’s bested a group of breweries from around the country to win the Samuel Adams Brewing the American Dream competition, earning it a one-year mentorship from one of the nation’s largest breweries. Brewers might be tempted to offer hyped-up or extreme beers on such a stage — think a murky IPA that uses an amount of hops that would outweigh a large infant, or a thick stout laced with a 7-Eleven aisle’s worth of confections. But Moor’s won on the strength of its soft and crushable kolsch.

Jennifer Glanville Love, a brewer and director of partnership of Boston Beer Co. and Samuel Adams, told the Tribune last year that Moor’s story and business plan also helped them come out on top.

“The place they’re in, the passion they have, the way they’ve grown so methodically, it all resonated,” Glanville Love told the Tribune. “The timing is perfect.”

Occupying New Spaces

Moor’s joined the Near West Side’s Funkytown Brewery in winning the Brewing the American Dream competition, won by the latter in 2023. Earlier this year, Funkytown announced plans to open its own space at 1923 W. Lake St. next year after receiving a $3.7 million Community Development Grant from the city’s Department of Planning and Development in January. It still needs to pick up the remaining capital of the $7.4 million project.

Last January, Moor’s partnered with Steep Ravine Brewing Company to revive the closed Ravinia Brewing space in Logan Square at 2601 W. Diversey Ave., offering beers from both breweries and a full menu and sports bar vibe.

But that location shuttered in September after what Johnson described as “unforeseen financial troubles and things that we weren’t aware of,” namely prior licensing and debt matters connected to Steep Ravine. A message was left seeking comment from Steep Ravine.

“We just never got around to what we planned to do. It wasn’t because of us, basically. We saw that as an opportunity to grow our brand and create something that was kind of new in the space,” Johnson said. “We were successful in some regard from a consumer perspective — people knew about it, that we were doing some cool stuff over there — but some internal business issues just prevented it from moving forward the way we planned.”

But “it gave me the opportunity to see that it could be successful,” he said.

In the meantime, Moor’s exists in spaces not often occupied by craft beer. It’s made cameos on episodes of “The Chi” series. In 2024, Moor’s hosted an Englewood bus tour featuring South Side historian Shermann “Dilla” Thomas. And Patton’s background in the hospitality industry has helped place Moor’s beers on fine-dining menus in the city, such as Adorn at the Four Seasons Downtown and Galit, a Michelin-starred restaurant in Lincoln Park.

“I look up to them and their persistence and how they have grown their business in the last couple years,” said Zachary Engel, executive chef and partner at Galit and Cafe Yaya. “I just enjoy being able to bask in their sunshine.”

Galit has been a vendor at each Emancipation Ball, and Engel said he keeps a Moor’s beer on his menu at all times. Engel does not describe himself as a “fancy beer person,” but he said Moor’s styles quickly connected with his sense for what would pair well with his Middle Eastern fare — such as the imperial porter accentuating Galit’s charcoal-grilled dishes, or its hummus finding harmony with Moor’s helles.

Before that first ball, Patton brought his mother to Galit. Engel said she loved the restaurant’s hummus and demanded that her son ask him to bring it to the first Emancipation Ball. She has since passed, but Engel said he’s bringing back the hummus this year. 

“That’s what we do for each other. To me, that feels very Chicago, to help each other out,” Engel said.

Big Dreams

Johnson said the brand started its Care Moor Foundation in 2022 to broaden the scope of its community outreach beyond beer. The Emancipation Ball serves as a benefit for the foundation, which in turn supports youth scholarship funds like the Marcus J. Bradshaw Foundation and Lafayette Gatling Scholarship Fund. It also supports youth summer camps.

This year’s Emancipation Ball also attracted sponsors like DreamFi, a “financial technology empowerment tool” founded by civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who represented the family of George Floyd and other high-profile victims of police brutality.

Johnson said Moor’s is still focused on attracting new customers to craft beer, adding that beer drinkers don’t need to align with any cultural stereotypes.

“You can dress up. You could listen to rap music. You can do fly sh-t, you can wear Jordans. Culture, it should really be for everybody,” he said. “People are connected with or attracted to brands that connect with them in different way. That’s why you see a Modelo become the No. 1 beer in America [in 2023], right?”

Moor’s beer is also sold in New Jersey and New York. Johnson said the brewery plans to enter the Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland area this summer, as well as North Carolina and Atlanta — thanks to New York-based Round Table Brewery contract-brewing beers for those markets. 

“I’m a big dreamer,” Johnson said.

Deth, who helped found what would become Illinois’ largest craft brewery, knows it’s a far harsher industry to break into today. Within the first weeks of 2026, three veteran Chicago breweries announced closures. And while breweries like Moor’s and Funkytown are trying to bring new people to the table, “they themselves are new to the table.”

That can be an asset, however.

“I told both of them that I think they each have mojo,” Deth said. “They’re cultivating fans and doing something fun and interesting that people want to ask more about and find more about. Their strength is the community they connect to.

“And they throw good parties.”