Reykjavík Grapevine - 19.11.2018, Side 48

48 The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 19— 2018
If you want to know how a hip micro-
brewery like Beljandi ended up in
Breiðdalsvík, a tiny town in Iceland’s
remote East Fjords, ask Elís Pétur Elís-
son about the mounted reindeer head
that overlooks his pub. The story—
like, perhaps, many good stories—be-
gins with a hunting trip and a bottle of
whiskey. In 2016, after a long day spent
hunting, Elís cracked open a bottle of
whiskey with his friend Daði Hrafn-
kelsson. Both Daði, a dentist in Den-
mark, and Elís, whose investments in
local fishing had paid off, wanted to
use their spare cash to revitalize their
hometown. But how? They tossed
around ideas, working their way
through the whiskey. By the middle of
the bottle, it was agreed: they would
open a brewery. “We shook hands and
started planning,” Elís says, “but of
course by the bottom of the bottle we
were way too drunk to put together
a business plan.” Completely serious,
if not sober, they proceeded with the
project, returning to Breiðdalsvík
with the kernel of an idea, a hangover,
and the massive reindeer head that
now surveys the spacious beerhall like
a guardian spirit, memorializing the
brewery’s boozy conception.
Uses and abuses
Like many small fishing villages,
Breiðdalsvík had suffered a slow, but
steady recession over the previous
two decades: younger generations
were moving away, leaving an aging
population and few opportunities for
cultural growth and civic pride. But
Elís and Daði saw promise in the dis-
used, crumbling buildings that dot
the town’s small centre. Shortly af-
ter their excursion, they bought the
abandoned building that now houses
Beljandi. Built as a slaughterhouse,
its subsequent uses and abuses left
mounds of rubbish for the two to clear
out.
Still, they were intent on preserv-
ing the character of the building.
With few major architectural inter-
ventions, it’s easy to imagine herds
of sheep huddled downstairs on the
killing floor where the gleaming gad-
getry of beer alchemy now stands. The
upstairs space, once used for salting
and drying sheep pelts, now houses
the cozily spare beerhall—Breiðdals-
vík’s only bar. Elís and Daði aimed to
fundamentally alter day-to-day life in
this town of 139 residents. “If people
wanted to grab a drink, they used to
have to go to someone’s house,” Elís
says, “Now they can go to the bar, sit
down, and have a chat.”
Small-town sitcom
Beljandi, however, is not Elís’ sole ex-
periment in reimagining the town’s
social possibilities; with his wife,
Helga Rakel Arnardóttir, Elís has
breathed new life into Kaupfjélagið,
the old general store directly beside
Beljandi. Decorated with wares and
ephemera from a predigital world, the
reimagined Kaupfjélagið is as much
a repository of local history as it is a
convenience store: signs and archival
documents on every wall blazon the
provincial minutia of Breiðdalsvík’s
past. By opening a casual eatery in the
shop—dishing up local fish and chips,
homemade cakes, and the occasional
reindeer burger—Elís and Helga have
nestled within their nostalgic time
capsule a vibrant and contemporary
community hub. In the sitcom of ev-
eryday life in Breiðdalsvík, Kaupfjé-
lagið is, without a doubt, the primary
set piece. A regular cast of locals trade
breezy banter over bottomless coffee;
a carton of milk is simply a pretext for
seeing who’s around.
In a town like Breiðdalsvík, with its
abundance of cheap, unused proper-
ties, Elís underscores how easy it can
be to affect societal change. “Things
don’t happen by themselves,” he says,
“But if people are willing to take some
chances, to do something out of the
ordinary, you can make a huge change
in a small place like this.” It helps,
of course, if that agenda for societal
change includes the promise of a
crisp, hoppy IPA.
Distance from
Reykjavík:
613 km
How to get there:
Route One south,
continuing beyond
the turnoff for the
Öxi mountain pass
Flights provided
by: gocarrental.is
Accommodation
provided by:
havari.is
Brewing
Community
Beljandi Brewery’s recipe for a hoppier Breiðdalsvík
Words & Photos: Eli Petzold
A fishing boat, yesterday A hoppin' good time