It’s strange to say that one of Sydney’s best beer bars could have a Melbourne homecoming, but it’s not far from the truth. Newtown’s Odd Culture was inspired by a trip around Belgium’s grand lambic breweries, where the sour ales are steeped in centuries-old tradition. The model, though, is pure inner-city Melbourne.

“Fitzroy is like a spiritual home for us,” says James Thorpe, CEO of the Odd Culture Group, which operates three other pubs up in Sydney. “The concept itself was inspired by that trip to Europe but it was also inspired by these cool little drink-in bottle shops in Melbourne, which are not something that we have in New South Wales due to licensing laws.”

On Brunswick Street, Odd Culture will finally get the chance to merge bar and bottle shop, like neighbours Near & Far and Slow Beer. As in Newtown, there’ll be an even split of minimal intervention wine and funky ales, but expect a more Victorian focus.

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“There’s a lot of similarities in the process that some of these brewers use to brew ancient styles of beer as there is in natural winemaking,” Thorpe says. “That’s where the concept came from, to build a space that would equally represent beer and wine, because normally you get one or the other.”

The balance of new and old is yet to be fully worked out ahead of its late May opening date, but a few Newtown favourites will make it down. Cocktails will remain a feature, with the famed Sour Negroni a certain starter. That’s a Negroni containing house-made vermouth produced from kriek lambic – a sour cherry beer that’s one of Belgium’s most famous exports.

The original Odd Culture is vast, which is not the case for the former MP’s office that will be home to the Fitzroy edition. That means the menu will mostly be snacks, but you’ll still get to try the chicken liver pate with fish sauce caramel that former Broadsheet Sydney editor Che-Marie Trigg called “next level” the first time she ate it.

Odd Culture will open at Shop 1/296 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy in May.