Blue Bottle Coffee opening first location in Chicago at new Wolf Point East tower
Blue Bottle Coffee will open its first location in Chicago next year. The craft coffee company plans to open a cafe at the new Wolf Point East apartment tower on the Chicago River in the spring of 2021. Future locations in the city will follow.
“It’s also our number one city in terms of number of Blue Bottle Coffee at-home subscribers who don’t yet live near a cafe, so we wanted to bring our cafes to them,” said CEO Karl Strovink in a release.
The origin story of Blue Bottle remains legendary among craft coffee followers. In 2002 former musician James Freeman founded the company roasting small batches of single origin beans, then sold them at a farmers market stand in Oakland, California. The first store, however, was opened in a dead end alleyway in the Hayes Valley neighborhood of San Francisco.
Nestle acquired a majority interest in Blue Bottle for $425 million in 2017. More than 90 cafes can now be found on the East and West coasts as well as in Asia.
The Blue Bottle location in the River North neighborhood of Chicago will feature a 400-square-foot patio overlooking the river with access to the Riverwalk. The cafe will be the only retail outlet in the building, which houses a number of private amenities for residents. The menu will offer seasonally changing coffees for pour-overs and espresso drinks, along with rotating blends and single origins.
Food will include their signature Liege Belgian waffles, cooked to order, plus avocado toast and chia pudding as well as other sweet and savory items. A local bakery, to be announced, will make additional pastries.
When restaurants can reopen for indoor service, Blue Bottle also plans to offer customers access to coffee tools for an interactive experience.
Blue Bottle Coffee, 313 W. Wolf Point Plaza Drive, bluebottlecoffee.com
