LeVeL33

The kettles came from Vienna and went up by crane. You are drinking where they landed.

Go for the beer and stay for the skyline, in that order. LeVeL33 is a working microbrewery on the top floor of Marina Bay Financial Centre Tower 1, the rare rooftop bar where the beer is the point rather than the backdrop, and it is best as an after-work round with colleagues or a sunset for visiting friends. The compromise: it is office drinks more than candlelit date, and the terrace, which is where you want to be, isn't guaranteed, so ask for it when you reserve.

Up by crane

When it opened in 2010, the hard part wasn't the view but the brewhouse. Most of the European-made kit was too big for the lifts, so the tanks, two copper kettles made in Vienna and a cooling machine went up by crane. In December 2024 Guinness World Records verified LeVeL33 as the highest microbrewery in a building, at 149.321 metres. Founder Martin Bem, an Austrian who built the Ponte group around Brotzeit, called the title a "gift to our whole team" in the brewery's 15th year. The Blond Lager now carries the record on its label, which is about as close as a beer gets to wearing a medal.

The beer

It is brewed on site from organic hops and malt, and the house range has included a lager, IPA, wheat beer, porter and stout. The oddity is the Brut Beer, made with Champagne yeast and fermented a second time in the bottle, linked to the venue's partnership with Barons de Rothschild and available only here. Brewmaster Gabriel Garcia has called it "an impossible goal to make a beer taste like champagne", which is an honest way to start a tasting.

The food

The kitchen calls its cooking "ContemBrewery" and uses spent grain from the mash in housemade pasta, bread and desserts. Beer runs through the dishes, from a lager-cured kingfish to a wheat-beer dashi. It is cooking built around the beer, and we would order it that way rather than treat the indoor dining room as the main event.

How to do it well

If you want the terrace at sunset, get there before the after-work crowd. The view across to Marina Bay Sands, the ArtScience Museum and the Singapore Flyer is the reason. Start with a tasting of the house brews before anything fancier, and if the Brut is pouring, try it. There is a weekday High Beer in the afternoons, and the brewery takes tour bookings; check the site for both. Downtown and Bayfront are the nearest MRT stations.

Good to know 8 Marina Boulevard, #33-01, Marina Bay Financial Centre Tower 1, a short walk from Downtown or Bayfront MRT. The official site gave daily hours of noon to 11pm and takes brewery-tour bookings; terrace seating isn't guaranteed, so ask when you reserve and check the site before you go.

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LeVeL33 | 8 Marina Boulevard #33-01, Marina Bay Financial Centre Tower 1, Singapore 018981 | Nearest MRT: Bayfront