OOLA Capitol Hill opened in August 2023.
Three years after closing the doors to our original production facility at 14th and Union, we returned triumphantly to Capitol Hill (just up the block!) with a bottle shop, cocktail bar and restaurant aptly titled: OOLA Capitol Hill.
This is our newest venture to showcase OOLA’s fine spirits within a PNW-inspired, casual fine dining experience.
Meet the Team
-
KT Niehoff
OWNER & PROPRIETOR
of OOLA Capitol Hill -
Kirby Kallas-Lewis
OWNER & HEAD DISTILLER
of OOLA Distillery -
Elizabeth Blacker
EXECUTIVE CHEF
Owner & Proprietor of OOLA Capitol Hill
KT Niehoff grew up in Denver as a weird kid that sang in a professional children’s choir that toured Mainland China. It was there she ate turtle soup and learned how to use chopsticks because it was the only option, and she was hungry. She had a single working mom and lived on TV dinners, pot pies, dried milk and Burger King.
When she was 16, she moved to Manhattan to attend TISCH School of the Arts at New York University. She got weirder but found her arty people so felt better. She moved to Seattle in 1992 where the Punk Riot Grrl politics and energy was the perfect incubator for her actionist nature. Over the next 25 years she became one of the most influential artists of the Seattle contemporary dance scene through founding Velocity Dance Center and creating her own multi-sensory, multi-dimensional performance environments, with highly-crafted audience participation. She is fascinated with creating experiences that incorporate art, food, drinks, and audience agency in service of bringing people together.
KT has designed and built two houses and three commercial spaces. It was a natural and obvious transition for her to open the restaurant Electric Cello and 10 degrees Art+Events in Georgetown to expand her visions of great art, conversations, food, drink, and ideas of how and why people gather.
KT Niehoff
Kirby Kallas-Lewis
Owner & Head Distiller of OOLA Distillery
Kirby Kallas-Lewis grew up in St. Paul riding horses, wreaking havoc, and seeing the world in a curious way. At 15 he saved up his grass-cutting money and used it all to go to the fanciest restaurant he could find in Minneapolis with his friend Charlie. He went to St. Olaf college and got a degree in sculpture and fine art. He spent all his time in the studio and missed all the rest of his classes.
He lived on a makeshift farm and decided to live on $1 a day. He worked in kitchens. He milked goats, made sock cheese, baked bread, grew veggies, threw pots, and lived in a souped-up chicken coup – his first building project. After school he hitchhiked to Alaska and worked on fishing boats where he often thought about pushing his sadistic skipper into the ocean.
After Alaska he bought a one-way ticket to the South Pacific. He threw pots by the piece in Australia, painted and lived in Tahiti and traveled by canoe through Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya. All the while he ate. Everywhere. From the fanciest most renowned restaurants to the street food in the markets. He learned wine, made prosciutto, plucked chickens, broke down pigs and smoked meats.
In 2008 he bought a still and put it in his bathtub. 12 years later he had built the oldest distillery in the Seattle area. They are organic and salmon safe and Kirby built a closed, recycling cooling water system that saves millions of gallons of water every year. OOLA has won multiple gold medals for every one of their spirits in top, international competitions, and more overall medals than Kirby can wear around his neck.
Liz Blacker
Executive Chef of OOLA Capitol Hill
Born and raised in the Pacific Northwest, Liz’s passion for hospitality began as a child learning to bake cookies with her aunt and delivering them to neighbors on Christmas Eve. After earning her culinary degree she obtained her bachelor's in hospitality management from South Seattle Community College. Her culinary expertise includes time as a Sous Chef at Cafe Juanita and later as Chef de Cuisine at Eden Hill Restaurant. Beyond her professional achievements, Elizabeth loves to use food as a means to connect with others, continually inspire guests and herself to keep trying new things. When not in the kitchen, you can find her immersed in books, spending quality time with her dogs Sirus and Violet, and tending to her jungle of plants.
We are building a space that is collaborative, inclusive, fun, and nurturing. I am grateful and lucky for the chance to lead the kitchen at OOLA Capitol Hill and to work with an amazing team that shares a passion for food, drink and hospitality. I’m excited to step into an Executive Chef position: to explore and challenge my creativity and create something exciting and memorable.