Boon Brewery Turns 50

This year marks a milestone for Brouwerij Boon — fifty years since its founding in 1975, when Frank Boon stepped into the world of lambics with a clear aim: to preserve and elevate Belgium's time-honoured tradition of spontaneous fermentation, geuze and kriek. From modest beginnings to international acclaim, Boon's journey is one of passion, patience, oak barrels, and wild yeasts.

Origins & Evolution

Though Boon as a brewery is formally fifty this year, its roots stretch much further back. The location and lineage tie into centuries of lambic brewing and blending in the Pajottenland / Senne Valley region, including the old blendery of René De Vits

• 1975: Frank Boon became involved by acquiring the De Vits blendery operation. He had begun experimenting with blending lambics, fermenting them into faro, geuze, etc.

• After some years of distributing beers and operating as a blendery, Boon set up its own brewing equipment, tanks, coolships (for spontaneous fermentation), and oak foeders.
• In 1990, the brewing started more fully at Lembeek with improved facilities, enabling Boon to produce its lambics, geuzes, krieks, etc., under its own roof.

Over the years, Boon has combined tradition with careful innovation: preserving wild yeasts, ageing beer in century-old oak foeders, blending aged and younger lambics to achieve balance, while also investing in visitor experiences, cellar ageing, and collaborations.

Boon's Beer Portfolio

What Boon is best known for is the full spectrum of lambic-based beers. Here are some of their key offerings:

• Oude Geuze Boon – The classic geuze, a blend of lambics aged for one, two, and three years, creating a bubbly, sparkling, sour, funky brew.
• Kriek Boon / Oude Kriek – Lambics fermented with cherries ("kriek"), yielding a mix of fruit, sourness, wood, and often a vivid, wine-like complexity.
• Framboise Boon – Similar to kriek but with raspberries; used to create a fruit lambic experience.
• Faro – A lighter, sweeter lambic style, often blended with sugar in earlier times. Boon has made versions of this.
• Mariage Parfait – One of Boon's more premium and expressive geuze beers. The name means "perfect marriage," referring to the blending of aged lambics in oak casks with younger lambics to achieve a harmonious, full-bodied flavour.

Here at The Belgian Beer Company, we stock a range of Boon beers, including the Duivels Donker and Duivels Wild. All are available by the bottle so perfect if you haven't tried them before. There is also Boon gift packs available and Boon branded glassware.

Geuze Mariage Parfait: What Makes It Special

Since it's central to the anniversary, it's worth looking more closely at Geuze Mariage Parfait (and its related forms):

• Composition: It is composed mainly of lambics aged for three years in oak barrels, especially in foeders built between 1883 and 1914 — some of the oldest in the brewery.
• A small component (about 5%) of young lambic is blended in to provide fermentable sugars and wild yeasts, which helps the bottle refermentation and carbonation.
• Flavour profile: Soft yet full-bodied, with citrus notes (grapefruit, lime), wood aromas (vanilla, cloves, oak), phenolic touches reminiscent of aged spirits, a wine-like acidity, and flavours of young apples. It's unsweetened, unfiltered, unpasteurised.

The 50th Anniversary Celebrations & Special Editions

To mark its golden anniversary, Boon is doing more than just raising a toast. Some of the highlights include:

• Visitor centre renovations: The brewery has revamped its touring experience. The cellars and brewery are more accessible, with upgraded information panels, mood-lighting, photos, TV screens and generally a more engaging visitor trail.
• Golden Anniversary Edition of Geuze Mariage Parfait: This "Golden Anniversary Edition" of Geuze Mariage Parfait, has a higher alcohol by volume (10 %), distinguishing it from the standard 8 %. It's a one-off created in celebration of the 50 years.

Reflections & What Lies Ahead

Fifty years is a long time in the brewing world, especially for beers that demand wild fermentation, barrel ageing, and patience. Boon has navigated many challenges: changing tastes, economic pressures, maintaining purity in wood, wild yeasts, and staying relevant without compromising tradition.

Now under the stewardship of the second generation (Frank Boon's sons, Jos and Karel), the brewery seems well placed to continue its legacy. The recent collaboration, renovations, and special brews are more than marketing – they are affirmations of commitment to place, process, and flavour.

A Toast to 50 Years

To raise a glass of Boon is to raise a glass to history — to the oak barrels whose wood breathes each year, to yeasts carried on the wind, to the patient hand of the blender, and to the drinker who lets the beer breathe, age, and surprise. The Mariage Parfait anniversary edition, and all Boon's beers, remind us that beer is not just about instant flavour, but ritual, time, craft, and memory.

Here's to the next 50 years of wild yeast, spontaneous fermentations, and ales that tell stories in every sip.

So, the next time you're browsing for something truly special, skip the supermarket six-pack and explore the rich, diverse world of Belgian beer. Trust me—from one beer connoisseur to another—there's nothing quite like it.