For Rebecca Bierden and Nathan Watt, the owners of the new Vicious Cycle Brewing in Fraser, turning their dreams into a reality led to opening a brewery.

It started with inspiration sparked during a trip Bierden took to Antarctica and her realization that fulfilling her own wanderlust was unavoidable.

“While I was (in Antarctica) I met some girls and they had been traveling the world for a couple years,” Bierden said. “They had quit their jobs and sold their cars. I came home from that trip and said to Nathan we have to do this. Let’s do it now while we’re young.”

In 2014 that is exactly what the couple did. They bought a one way ticket to London and started traveling throughout Europe. In nearly two years of traveling, they visited every continent and 29 countries.

“While we were traveling, we said when we get back, let’s not go back to our regular lives,” Bierden said. “Let’s open up a brewery.”

As the couple traveled through Cambodia, they came across a shop named Vicious Cycle.

“We were like that should totally be our name,” Bierden said. “We had started traveling because we wanted to get out of the vicious cycle of life, like the mundane.”

Watts had gotten started brewing at home in St. Louis several years before while Bierden was finishing her residency.

“I bought (Nathan) a brewing system for his birthday one year and he fell in love with brewing,” Bierden said. “He did it on the side, kind of like dabbling. We always loved going to breweries.”

When the couple moved to Loveland in 2011, Bierden said it cemented their love for the craft beer scene.

“Nathan (became) really good at home brewing and we both got kind of burnt out of the medical field,” Bierden said.

Watt ultimately graduated from the American Brewers Guild in 2015 and went on to work for Left Hand Brewing and brew for Jagged Mountain Craft Brewery, turning his passion into a career.

The entity of Vicious Cycle Brewing began to unfold once the couple returned to the states from their adventures abroad in 2017.

“Our buddy has a condominium up here (in Fraser) and said you should really go look at Fraser,” Watt said.

In 2019, Bierden and Watt purchased the empty lot next to Bank of the West.

“We started construction late 2019,” Watt said.

“And our plan was to open in 2020,” Bierden laughs.

Eager to get the business going despite the pandemic, Watt became the general contractor. Vicious Cycle Brewing began construction with the help of friends, family, neighboring breweries, local subcontractors and the couple’s handy work.

“So we (almost) built everything, except what we needed permits for,” Watt said. “My folks moved from Wisconsin to Colorado and they came up every weekend for almost six months. We just busted it out.”

He plans to open with a New England India pale ale, pale ale, Irish red and coffee stout. In the future, look out for more sour and IPA beers.

Vicious Cycle will carry 12 beers on tap at all times. The brewery will have 10 in house beers with two taps reserved for rotating a hard kombucha, gluten free, or an alcohol-reduced beer option.

Phlavor food truck, located next to Vicious Cycle, will be serving Asian cuisine to compliment the craft beer selections.

As Vicious Cycle and Phlavor food truck come to fruition, Fraser is eagerly anticipating the next brewery and food truck combination coming to town. Look out for an opening date in late February. The brewery is currently hiring bartenders.

Vicious Cycle plans to be open 6 days a week, closed on Tuesdays. Mondays will have a designated locals happy hour. For more information, email info@viciouscyclebrewery.com.

Editor’s Note: This story has been corrected to reflect the accurate spelling of Nathan Watt’s name and the timeline of brewing at Vicious Cycle.