The “Turnstiles” can. (Image courtesy of Bluejacket)

The D.C.-made brew “Turnstiles” has a Metro-themed can, but the folks at Bluejacket swear the similarities are purely exterior: the beer tastes like citrus, not … whatever you imagine the train system would taste like.

The Brutalist design adorning the IPA is part of Bluejacket’s relatively new canning program. Each Friday since the beginning of March, the brewery has released two or three of its beers in aluminum vessels for sale in its on-premises shop.

They got into the canning game when it became possible to purchase cans in smaller batches, according to Greg Engert, the beer director at Bluejacket, which fits with the brewer’s sensibility. “It never made sense for us to have to commit to a truckload of cans because we like to brew new things all the time,” he tells DCist.

It does lead to one challenge: “With the amount of beers that we’re producing, we’re obviously having to come up with lots of different names,” says Engert. “There are 6,500 plus breweries and everyone is making dozens of beers at a time, so it’s hard to come up with the names of beers that haven’t been taken.”

Getting to the name “Turnstiles” is a great example of how their creative process works. It didn’t start out as an ode to Metro.

Engert says a lot of Bluejacket’s naming inspiration comes from song lyrics. Michael Babin, the founder of Neighborhood Restaurant Group, sent Engert “Over the Turnstile” as a name for the new IPA. It’s a snippet from the Pavement tune “Range Life,” which has a line that says “Over the turnstile turn out in the traffic.”

They decided to shorten it further to “Turnstiles.”

It was during the label design process that the beer got its WMATA tie-in. The design, flagged by BrutalistDC, began with creative director Kris Mullins sending along imagery of classic New York City turnstiles (D.C. faregates are not technically turnstiles).

After they settled on transportation-themed imagery, they decided to bring the look closer to home—”when we started thinking about iconic images, the arch of Metro came to mind,” says Engert.

The process moves quickly: Engert says they taste everything on a Monday that they’re considering before canning it on Thursday for a Friday release. Bluejacket cans about 50 cases per beer, which generally sell out by the next release (“Turnstiles” is still available for purchase).

“It’s the epitome of freshness, and hop-forward beers benefit the most from freshness,” says Engert.

“Turnstiles” is definitely a hop-forward beer—it mixes a modern hop, called citra, with amarillo and centennial, two hops considered more classic in the beer brewing world.

Despite its ties to the transportation system, drinking “Turnstiles” on the Metro remains illegal.