Breweries in Reston and Herndon: Which One Fits the Night You Want

Seven places in Reston and Herndon pour brewery beer within a few miles of each other. One brews on a one-barrel system behind the bike racks of a Reston bike shop. Another pours a Pennsylvania brand next to a row of pinball machines. Three of them opened in Herndon in 2026, and an eighth is getting ready at Reston Town Center.

When friends ask us which one to try, we answer with a question: what kind of night do you want? Some of these rooms suit a quiet pint. Others are built for a crowd, a full dinner, or a loud Friday. We’ve called the Reston area home since 1996 and have spent plenty of evenings in all of them, so this guide sorts them by the night each one fits instead of ranking them.

Each brewery is getting its own post in this series. We link them here as they publish.

The short version: match the brewery to the night

• A quiet pint, before or after a ride: Bike Lane Brewing, Reston
• Trivia and talking to your neighbors: Lake Anne Brew House, Reston
• The beer itself: Hawkley Brewing, Herndon
• Dinner with good beer: Ornery Beer Company Public House or NH44 Indian Brewing, Herndon
• A big group: Aslin Beer Company, downtown Herndon
• Bar energy on a weekend night: Voodoo Brewing, Dulles Station

Whether the beer is brewed on site matters less to us than the room and the people in it.

Bike Lane Brewing pours a quiet pint inside a Reston bike shop

The Bike Lane is a full-service bike shop first, with a coffee bar and a very small brewery sharing the room on Sunset Hills Road, about 50 feet from the W&OD Trail. Anne and Todd Mader moved the shop there from Reston Town Center in 2018. Todd learned on a homebrew kit Anne gave him, and the brewery was built around a one-barrel electric system. A barrel is 31 gallons, so each batch fills about two kegs.

We go to Bike Lane when we want a pint without much conversation. We sit, drink something cold and watch cyclists come and go. It fits a break between errands, and it fits the end of a ride. We’ve started and finished mountain bike rides there, since riders can reach the Lake Fairfax Park trails from the SkateQuest lot on Michael Faraday Court, just around the corner.

The Maders have backed the local cycling community for years, including rides and events with MORE, the Mid-Atlantic Off-Road Enthusiasts. MORE’s youth mountain bike rides have met at the shop on Tuesday evenings, with popsicles for the kids and a beer on the patio for the parents afterward. Bike Lane’s hazy IPA, Hellwig, won gold at the 2023 Virginia Craft Beer Cup.

Lake Anne Brew House runs like a neighborhood pub, packed with regulars

Jason and Melissa Romano opened Lake Anne Brew House in April 2016 in a 1,000-square-foot space on the waterfront at Lake Anne Plaza. Jason, the brewmaster, has brewed for more than 30 years. Melissa is an architect and designed the mid-century modern taproom. The couple has lived on Lake Anne since 2003.

The Brew House feels like a pub in England or Ireland, set inside a 1960s brutalist plaza. The concrete outside can look stark. The people inside warm it up. Regulars fill the room, newcomers get waved in, and strangers at neighboring tables end up talking to each other. In our experience, conversations between tables start more easily here than at any other brewery on this list.

Thursday is trivia night. We play on a team called the Amoebas, and over the years we brought our kids, Jack and Claire, who grew up playing along with us. Both have since worked behind the bar at the Brew House. A few regulars we met there have joined the Amoebas, and we text them when we’re heading over. Other regular teams sit a few tables away, and the rivalry gets loud in a friendly way.

The bar staff mixes younger bartenders with longtime Restonians who seem to know everyone. They make a first visit feel like the start of a habit.

Our order every time is the Live Work Play IPA, a nod to Reston founder Robert E. Simon’s live, work, play idea. The rotating list also covers lagers, a porter and an amber. Reston Red, the amber, won gold at the 2023 Virginia Craft Beer Cup. The non-alcoholic choices are good, and so are the Nordic Knot pretzels, from a bakery founded in Reston. The Brew House added pizza, so a long trivia night no longer means ordering in from another plaza restaurant. Its current policy does not allow outside food.

A Beer Run Club leaves Saturday mornings at 9:45 for laps around the lake, and on the first Friday of each month the taproom opens at 10 a.m. for people who want to work from the Brew House. Around Halloween, witches on paddleboards have circled the lake. The brewery also joins the plaza’s bigger events, including the ones the Reston Museum hosts.

In 2025 the Romanos leased the former Chesapeake Chocolates space next door to roughly double their seating. While they wait on final county approvals, the space is open as Vintage Reston, a mid-century resale pop-up where you can relax and shop the furniture.

Besides the main plaza lot, where the Saturday farmers market sets up, a second public lot sits behind the brewery. We think of it as the secret lot. Enter it from North Shore Drive on the Hickory Cluster side and park in the public spaces by the office building, never in the condominium or residential lots, which tow. The brewery’s own directions use 11401 North Shore Drive for GPS. Kids of all ages are welcome, and dogs can join you on the brick patio. The taproom is open Wednesday through Sunday.

For more on the plaza and the homes around it, see our Lake Anne neighborhood guide.

Hawkley Brewing makes ambitious beer and walks first-timers through it

Hawkley Brewing opened on March 20, 2026 at 257 Sunset Park Drive in Herndon. Aslin started in the same space in 2015, and Juicy Brewing poured there until October 2025. Co-owner Monte Hawkins opened Hawkley after his federal job was eliminated in 2025. Head brewer Mike Kulha came from Circa Brewing in Brooklyn and Lost Boy Cider in Alexandria.

The beer is excellent. We don’t usually drink black lagers, but Hawkley’s Fly By Night has become our go-to there. It pours with a thick, fluffy head and looks like a Guinness, then drinks smooth, with subtle flavors we still can’t name. The staff care about the pour, and they talk you through each beer. Kulha told us the goal is a lineup interesting enough for regulars and approachable enough that a first-timer never feels intimidated.

The taproom is small, so the room feels full and lively. Hawkley has kept events coming since opening, including a six-month anniversary beer dinner in September. Food trucks come on weekends, and you can bring your own food. Sunset Park is an office park full of small businesses, including gymnastics, dance and martial arts studios, so parking gets tight at busy hours, and parents with a kid in a class nearby have somewhere good to wait. Hawkley is closed Mondays.

If the crowds hold, we’d expect Hawkley to start looking for a bigger space within a few years. Read our grand opening visit for more.

Ornery’s Herndon public house is a restaurant first, with beer brewed in Bristow

Ornery Beer Company Public House opened in November 2025 in Woodland Park Crossing, the Harris Teeter center off Sunrise Valley Drive. Founder Randy Barnette grew up in Herndon and graduated from Herndon High. All 14 taps come from Ornery’s Bristow brewery, and since the company closed its Fairfax City pub in July 2026, Herndon is its only restaurant. The Bristow brewery keeps a taproom of its own.

We think of Ornery as a beer-themed restaurant. The kitchen turns out good, elevated bar food, and the room stays lively while you can still hold a conversation. It suits families, and it would suit a work lunch too.

We always start with two appetizers, the pork belly and the fried shrimp in a spicy sauce. Our usual main is the French dip, built almost like a cheesesteak, with melted cheese on French bread and a side of au jus. For beer, we order whatever IPA, lager or pilsner is on that day. Park in front of the Harris Teeter or in the garage below.

NH44 Indian Brewing pairs house beer with Indian food at Arrowbrook Centre

NH44 Indian Brewing Co. opened in June 2026 at 2336 Silver Arrow Way in Arrowbrook Centre. Owner Srikanth Mallepally brews on a 3.5-barrel system and named the brewery for National Highway 44, India’s longest highway, which runs from Kashmir to the country’s southern tip. The logo’s two crossed hand plows honor the farmers who grow the grain.

NH44 feels like a restaurant first. The menu runs from tandoor plates such as shrimp tandoor and lamb seekh kabob to kulchas, a stuffed Indian flatbread, filled with lamb or potato. For dessert there is kheer, a cardamom rice pudding. We had the chicken tikka pizza. NH44 brews with flavors you rarely find in an American taproom: a basmati rice lager, a witbier with ginger and coriander, a mango wheat, and small batches brewed with cardamom, rose or hibiscus. There is a full bar for anyone who wants a cocktail instead. NH44 is not large, and we expect it to build a loyal following.

Aslin handles a crowd, with a beer garden, a rooftop and IZZI next door

Aslin Beer Company opened on September 19, 2015 at Sunset Park as Herndon’s first craft brewery. A fire marshal ruling forced it to scale back there, and Aslin spent four years working to stay in town before it opened on Elden Street on December 14, 2020, in a former auto parts store. It has since grown into a regional brand with taprooms in Alexandria, D.C., Pittsburgh and Virginia Beach, and it brews most of its beer in Alexandria.

Aslin Herndon is the brewery we suggest for a group. We usually sit outside, under the tent or in the yard between the main building and IZZI, where the long picnic tables and benches feel like a German beer garden. A crowd can also spread out on the rooftop or inside either building. Orange Starfish, the hazy IPA, is the beer Aslin is best known for.

IZZI, Aslin’s scratch kitchen and café, opened next door in 2022 and is best known for pizza. Our favorite is the fig pizza, with prosciutto and hot honey. Families are welcome until 7 p.m., when Aslin becomes 21 and over, and dogs are allowed in the beer garden. Aslin does not allow outside food. Park behind the building off Center or Locust Street, and stay out of the lot by the brick building next door, where cars get towed.

Voodoo Brewing brings bar energy to Dulles Station

Voodoo Brewing opened on October 24, 2026, on the ground floor of the Makers Rise apartments on Dulles Station Boulevard, a short walk from the Innovation Center Metro station. The brand started in Meadville, Pennsylvania, in 2005. Franchise owner John Curry Lee lives in Reston, and his taproom pours beer from Voodoo’s Pennsylvania breweries rather than brewing its own.

Voodoo feels like a bar, and the area can use one. The music runs on the loud side but never so loud you can’t hear the people at your table. The crowd is a good, diverse mix. Inside, most of the seating is stand-up tables, and people move around and walk up to the bar. The patio is quieter and dog-friendly, so a calmer evening is still possible. A few TVs hang on the walls without taking over, so we wouldn’t call it a game-day bar.

Pinball machines, bright murals by a Reston artist and a hidden door decorated as a tribute to cats fill out the room. A small stage in the corner is set up for bands, trivia on Tuesdays and theme nights, starting with a Halloween party. Beyond the beer, the bar pours wine, cocktails and frozen margaritas.

We had the Good Vibes West Coast IPA and a hazy IPA. The chicken fingers came out moist and stayed hot to the last one, and the fries, cooked in beef tallow, have a little extra richness. The smash burger was very good. Next time we want to compare it against the bigger burger on the menu.

Makers Rise residents can walk downstairs, and a new apartment building with ground-floor retail is under construction across the street. We expect Voodoo to help pull more shops and restaurants into that new retail space. Read our first look inside for the full story.

Dogfish Head Alehouse and a Commerce Metro Center brewery come next

Dogfish Head Alehouse is targeting a fall opening on the second floor of the AC Hotel building on Inspiration Street at Reston Town Center. An independent operator runs it under license and pours beer brewed by Dogfish Head in Delaware.

We were regulars at the old Dogfish Head Alehouse at Greenbriar in Fairfax, which closed in 2023. We went for an easygoing room and a house blend of the 60 Minute and 90 Minute IPAs that we still miss. Our question for the Town Center location is whether it keeps that approachable feel or goes more upscale to match its neighbors. We’ll report back after it opens.

Further out, Comstock’s plan for Commerce Metro Center near the Wiehle-Reston East Metro station includes a brewery at one of its retail buildings. No operator has been named.

Breweries give Reston and Herndon more third places

Sociologist Ray Oldenburg coined the term third places for the spots outside home and work where people gather by habit and run into each other. Restaurants run on a pace: order, eat, pay and free up the table. At a brewery you can stay for hours and meet as many new people as you want to.

Lake Anne Plaza was much quieter before the Brew House opened in 2016. Since then, in our view, the plaza has come alive in the evenings and become an easier place for other small businesses to open. Downtown Herndon already had Jimmy’s Old Town Tavern and several good, quieter restaurants. Aslin added a crowd and evening energy on Elden Street, and some of those visitors go on to find the other places on the block. We expect Voodoo to do the same for Dulles Station.

We go back to two or three of these places most often, but each one gives us a reason to go. The choice depends on who we’re meeting, whether we want to talk to strangers, and how loud a night we’re after. Having all of these options within a few miles makes Reston and Herndon better places to live. If you’re house hunting and want a brewery within walking distance, we can tell you which neighborhoods put you there.

The breweries at a glance

Several taprooms keep short hours early in the week. Lake Anne Brew House opens Wednesday through Sunday, Hawkley closes Mondays, and the larger places run later on weekends. Check each brewery’s site before you go.

More from our Reston and Herndon brewery series

• Voodoo Brewing Herndon is open: inside the Dulles Station taproom
• Hawkley Brewing is open in Herndon
• Coming soon: Lake Anne Brew House, Aslin Beer Company, Bike Lane Brewing, NH44 Indian Brewing and Ornery Beer Company Public House

See something missing or wrong? Email us at [email protected] and we will check it and update the post.