Living a block south from campus, it would have been impossible to miss the huge amount of construction recently. This week, though, it’s a smaller project that has my attention. The Institute bought the College Ave. location that formerly housed Screen-It (a small silk-screening shop that moved to Hoosick St. in Brunswick), gutted it, and put a coffee shop in its place. Java++ opened on Monday, and since I’d gotten off work early, I wandered over to check it out.
The first thing I noticed were the hours of operation, which are outstanding—open until midnight Sunday through Thursday, and unitl 2 am Friday and Saturday nights! For the early risers among us (myself included. unfortunately), Java++ begins serving at 7:30 am weekdays and 10:00 am on weekends. The really early risers are still going to have to run to Stewart’s or Dunkin’ Donuts, or brew their own damn coffee.
The interior has a typical art deco motif—lots of straight lines, odd angles, and a bright-but-not-neon palette. Mauve, lavender, spring green, and pumpkin are integral to the color scheme, and there’s also a fair bit of polished metal, including the gas-powered fireplace at one end of the room.
The fare is exactly what you’d expect: several kinds of tea, baked sweets (cookies, muffins, etc.), soups, sandwiches, and, of course, coffee in myriad forms. My arrival was well-timed, just beating the 2:00 rush, so I was served immediately. They make their sandwiches to order, and I went with half of a ham, turkey, and Swiss with a bowl of corn chowder.
My meal was fairly average, about on par with the McNeil Room. Given that Sodexho runs the establishment, this isn’t terribly surprising. It was plain, simple, filling, and in the case of the soup, hot—on a day where the mercury spent most of its time below zero, it was just what I wanted. To drink, I opted for a mocha latte, which was not quite as rich as it could have been, but tasty nonetheless.
For a coffee shop, service and atmosphere are probably even more important than food. The service was friendly enough, but no one seemed very certain of what they were doing—an artifact, I expect, of the first day of nearly any business. Some large display menus would likely help both the staff and the customers. A clock would be nice, too.
I settled into one of the big leather armchairs, sipped my coffee, and watched folks come and go as I graded papers. Business was brisk enough, with staff and administrators making up a large portion of the clientele—I recognized Ginny Gregg (VP for finance), Pete Snyder (director of residence life), and Norris Pearson (director of conference services) in the hour that I was there, and I heard the restaurant manager say that Dr. Jackson was in earlier in the day. It’s a comfortable environment—maybe a bit brighter than most places, but that’s largely due to the snow.
To summarize, there’s not a lot that sets it apart from similar establishments. There’s wireless Internet access, but even that’s common nowadays. Throw in a chessboard or two, some non-pop music (classical, punk, jazz—it really doesn’t matter) playing in the background, a few more pretensions along the lines of calling a small coffee “Tall,” and it really could pass for any of a thousand and one other coffee shops. (And that’s just in the Seattle metro area.)
This one, though, is ours. And, all kidding aside, I’m very glad it’s here—an establishment like Java++ this close to campus is one more step in improving student life at the ‘Tute.
Java++ is on the corner of 15th St. and College Ave. To get there, walk to the front door of Academy Hall. Rotate your body pi/2 radians about the axis pointing upwards. Walk forward about 25 meters and you’ll be at the door to the cafe.
