Brasserie Houppe

The Wépion site feels like a confident, professionally organised modern brewery. The main production buildings are substantial without being on the scale of Belgium’s largest breweries, while the visitor facilities include a dedicated shop, bar and auditorium used for regular tours and events.

The shop is not immediately obvious from outside, but the welcome was excellent. On our visit, a member of staff walked us through the brewery to the shop and spent time talking through the range of beers on offer. That included some of the brewery’s more unusual experiments, such as a Belgian blond flavoured with a local Namur mustard, alongside a surprisingly good alcohol-free beer.

There is a clear sense that Houppe has grown beyond its small start-up origins while retaining the enthusiasm behind the original project. The operation is polished and visitor-friendly, but still feels close enough to the brewing itself for staff to talk knowledgeably and enthusiastically about what they are producing.

The brewery opens regularly for public visits. Its programme includes organised tours and events, although opening arrangements should be checked before travelling.

One member of staff cheerfully described Houppe as a brewery of blond beers, even while selling us a pils, two IPAs and several flavoured variants. It was a nice reminder that a brewery’s own sense of its beers can be broader and more instinctive than the neat categories we use to classify them.

Houppe’s recurring stilt-walker motif is rooted in Namur itself. The city has a centuries-old tradition of stilt jousting, now recognised by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage, and the brewery uses that local imagery throughout its branding. Even the name Jambes en l’air — “legs in the air” — plays neatly with the same idea. English-speaking drinkers may also spot an unintended extra joke: after enough beer, being “legless” means something rather different.