Coava Coffee Roasters occupies a converted former gymnatorium in Portland's Southeast industrial district — a vast vaulted space with a curved laminated wood bar at its centre, the counter constructed in the same steam-bent timber tradition as the building itself. The bar is a genuinely beautiful piece of furniture: a half-ellipse of riveted hardwood slats with a polished concrete surface, arranged around the espresso and pour-over station. Overhead, amber pendant lights hang from exposed beam ceilings. The shelving behind holds the roastery's current single-origins in the clinical way that serious coffee roasters present product — small quantities, considered labels, the expectation that you know what you're looking for. The space is large enough to absorb its crowd without noise accumulating, which is unusual. The coffee is technically exceptional. The building earns the coffee.
Pearl District, Portland, United States