Venue Type: Coffeehouse
Coffeehouses used to be the places where hipsters gathered. Well, that and teens who couldn’t get into bars, but also thought they were hip. I know because I was one of those kids hanging out at these joints in the late 80s in LA. There was inevitably some douche on an acoustic guitar playing Pink Floyd and Bob Marley covers in between the slacker barista’s mixed tape of The Smiths and The Damned deep cuts. The girls in their red lipstick, summer dresses and combat boots. It was an alt. high school boy’s dream. At least that’s how I remember it. But the point is, there was a coffeehouse culture — one that I, now as a middle-aged person, am not aware still exists. At least not beyond places like La Colombe, which employs those same barista types who definitely would press play on their private cassette stash in order to subject us all to their hipster bonafides. Not the least of which would be using an actual cassette tape in 2024.
The culture has changed a lot in the intervening years. But there is still a place for white guys with dreads, ear plugs and neck tattoos to work. And that is at joints like La Colombe. Because in this day and age we, the public, feel like the cooler and more alt. our baristas are, the better, or more bespoke, the brew is going to be. It’s a psychological thing. Does the bandanaed, face-pierced living art project work at Starbucks? No way. That shit is mainstream and plays like Dave Matthews and John Tesh for square preppies. Or whatever the 2024 version of that is. Look, I’m so hip I don’t even know what passes for square!
But I suppose people don’t go to coffeehouses for style points anymore. Because they actually care about coffee. A lot. Back when I first walked into La Colombe it did seem pretty foreign and fancy. I had no clue this joint is headquartered in Philadelphia. Notoriously not foreign. Nor fancy. But damn if it didn’t taste that way. My first experience was an iced coffee (or cold brew — I still don’t know the difference) into which they dropped an espresso bomb. A floater, I guess. I drink my stuff black. And boy was it black. Rich and dark and almost smelling of jet fuel and fresh gravesite. Back at the office I was practically levitating with the caffeine buzz. I felt alive. Like I could punch through a cinderblock wall. I think I wrote some of the best emails of my life that afternoon. 472 of them. This is the power of La Colombe.
75 Vandam St.
212/929-9699
lacolombe.com