There’s something going on right now in the Denver specialty coffee scene, and as proof we’re offering up not one but two new Build-Outs today from the Mile High City. Up first, an exciting new coffee roaster called Commonwealth Coffee, finding its retail legs with a custom bike mounted “espresso trike” pop-up in front of one of Denver’s hottest new restaurants.
As told to Sprudge by Ryan Fisher.
Can you tell us a bit about your new space?
We have really come to love a local noodle restaurant here in Denver called Uncle (recently named Denver’s “Best New Restaurant” by Westword), and so we approached the owner about doing a sort of semi-perminent pop-up out front. Our space is pretty unique. We have a beautiful bike mounted espresso trike set up out front of the restaurant, where we will make all the drinks, but our customers will be able to use the seating inside, too, giving our customers the ability to stick around and enjoy their drinks in ceramic. We are pretty excited to be partnering with these guys and a couple of the chefs at Uncle are also producing pastries for us under the name “Heirloom Bakeshop”.
What’s your approach to serving coffee?
We just really love the community aspect of coffee. We love beautiful tasting cups of coffee and properly extracted, sweet espresso, but even more we love sharing them with people. We called ourselves Commonwealth Coffee for a reason. We believe that an amazing cup of coffee requires an amazing experience for the customer, an experience that benefits everyone.
Any machines, coffees, special equipment lined up?
Since we are mobile, we had some restraints in terms what we could offer, but we decided to embrace those restraints in our build-out. We have a rebuilt Astoria lever machine from the 90s that Jason outfitted to run on propane for espresso drinks and for our grinder we have the beautiful HG One Grinder, which uses no electricity. It’s a bit more labor intensive to make a drink on our mobile bar. We are also proud of our completely custom cart, made with repurposed vintage bike parts and African Sapele wood. The bike frame was built by Oak Cliff Cargo Bikes, while Jim Simon at Koostik is responsible for the beautiful woodwork.
What’s your hopeful target opening month?
The 3rd week of September, barring setbacks with permitting. Exact details of our opening will be released on Twitter…and to pique everyone’s interest, we will be releasing detail regarding the launch of our custom built Airstream espresso bar over Twitter in coming weeks, too.
Revisit past Build-Outs in our handy archive.
