Aug. 20th, 2016 was an incredible day in Kingston. It was an emotional adventure as The Tragically Hip played their last show here in their hometown. In honour of this and Gord's outstanding strength we brewed a beer with love in our hearts and The Hip on full blast in our downtown brewhouse and thus Pretty Things, a belgian style table beer was born.

"Pretty Things is from the song Wheat Kings, so we needed to make a wheat-based beer. Given the time, we wanted to do something inspired by the summer season. We wanted a nice, balanced beer that was expressive but not overpowering. That ties into the songs of The Hip. It's timeless." - SCA Brewmaster, Justin da Silva

This was our way of giving something back to a band who, for many of us, had given us so much. We enlisted the skills of a talented graphic designer, Steve St. Pierre, to thoughtfully dream up artwork for the bottle label, t-shirts and posters. Profit from sales of these beautiful pieces went to Gord Downie Fund for Brain Cancer Research at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto.

"I wanted to isolate Gord and turn him into a silver beam," St. Pierre said. "I didn't realize he'd be wearing the shiny suits on the tour. I just turned the middle sheaf into silver. I wanted to focus on the five gentlemen who have been such an integral part of the landscape for 30 years."

Between beer, t-shirt and poster sales (which sold out in a matter of days) we successfully raised $4500 to for Gord Downie Fund for Brain Cancer Research! We also got an overwhelming request from across this beautiful country of ours for access to these rad t-shirts and posters. 

With Gord's new project Secret Path  which acknowledges a dark part of Canada’s history (the long-suppressed mistreatment of Indigenous children and families by the residential school system) with the hope of starting our country on a road to reconciliation, we realized this would be a perfect time to put those t-shirts back out there. 

This time, profit from sales of Pretty Things t-shirts and posters will be donated to Gord Downie & Chanie Wenjack Fund; and both are available online here. The Fund operates out of the Toronto Foundation and focuses on cross-cultural education to support healing and recovery.