De Proefbrouwerij is a Flemish brewery founded in 1996 by Dirk Naudts and his wife Saskia Waerniers. The brewery is located in the village of Lochristi, near Ghent. They operate as a rental brewery, creating beers for third party brewers, as well as producing their own beers. They also operate a research and development department focused on the science of brewing.

The “proef” brewery is specifically equipped for the development and production of beers for third parties.

They brew on a relatively small scale: most often between 10 and 140 hectoliters per order. Our customers include beer architects (who most often contribute their own recipe), start-up or existing breweries (who have their own recipe or a recipe that is jointly developed), and individual initiatives.

The Research and Development department (R&D) conducts applied scientific research projects, in order to improve beer quality and reproducibility.